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The  Quora  Hi 

and  its 


<&L      Ml 


^=^S«sv  Ak 


v  William  CA.  Blew 


JOHNA.SEAVERNS 


Webster  Family  Library  of  Veterinary  Medicine 
Cummings  School  of  Veterinary  Medicine  at 
Tufts  University 
200  Westboro  Road 
North  Grafton,  MA  01536 


THE  QUORN   HUNT 
AND    ITS   MASTERS 

W.  C.  A.  BLEW 


THE  QUORN  HUNT 
AND  ITS  MASTERS 


BY 


WILLIAM    C.   A.   BLEW 

(Editor  of  Vyner's  "  Notitia  Venatica,"  and  Delme  Radcliffe's  "Noble 
Science  of  Fox-Hunting,''  ''Brighton  and  its  Coaches") 


WITH   24  ILLUSTRATIONS   DRAWN   BY 
HENRY    ALKEN 

12   OF   WHICH    ARE   COLOURED    BY    HAND 

ALSO  A  COLOURED  MAP  OF  THE  QUORN 
AND  SURROUNDING  COUNTRIES 


LONDON 
JOHN     C.     N1MMO 

i4    KING    WILLIAM    STREET,    STRAND 
MDCCCXCIX 


Printed  by  Ballantyne,  Hanson  &>  Co. 
At  the  Ballantyne  Press 


PREFACE 


WHEN  the  idea  of  compiling  this  book  was  origi- 
nally conceived,  the  intention  was  that  it  should 
enter  more  into  detail  than  was  subsequently  found  to 
be  possible  without  making  the  work  unduly  bulky.  On 
this  account  it  is  that  runs  are  mentioned  sparingly. 
Captain  Pennell-Elmhirsts  "The  Cream  of  Leicester- 
shire" and  "The  Best  Season  on  Record,"  though  ex- 
tending over  no  more  thar^  seven  years,  together  exceed 
the  size  of  this  outline  sketch.  An  account  of  a  good 
run,  penned  by  one  who  can  both  ride  and  write,  makes 
charming  reading,  but  a  mere  enumeration  of  the  points 
touched  would  interest  no  one.  After  perusing  the 
diary  kept  for  about  ten  years  by  "Cork-legged  Jones" 
(see  p.  51),  and  the  accounts  of  other  runs,  one  is 
perhaps  warranted  in  arriving  at  the  conclusion  that 
sport  aforetime  did  not  materially  differ  from  that  en- 
joyed at  the  present  day. 

Nearly  all  the  history  of  the  Ouorn  which  has  al- 
ready been  printed  has  concerned  Mr.  Meynell,  Mr. 
Assheton  Smith,  and  Mr.  Osbaldeston,  and  as  so  much 
has  been  said  about  the  two  latter,  the  reason  is  given 
at  page  85  why  these  two  heroes  are  here  dealt  with 
somewhat  shortly.  All  available  sources  have  been 
searched,  and  the  aim  has  been  to  give  as  many  as 
possible  of  little-known  facts  and  anecdotes,  and  not  to 
reproduce,  to  a  greater  extent  than  is  absolutely  neces- 
sary, matter  which  in  book,  newspaper,  and  magazine 
has  been  published  over  and  over  again. 


vi  PREFACE 

Great  difficulty  has  been  encountered  in  spelling 
names  of  places  and  coverts.  Various  readings  are  to 
be  found  in  maps,  directories,  and  guide-books,  and  I 
have  no  means  of  saying  whether  the  manner  adopted 
in  these  pages  of  spelling  Munday's  Gorse  and  many 
other  places  is  correct.  In  old  accounts  of  runs  (in 
some  modern  accounts  too)  Ellar's  Gorse  has  been 
spelled  Ella's  ;  Kinoulton  sometimes  has  two  n's,  some- 
times one  only ;  there  is  also  a  doubt  whether  Glen 
Gorse  should  have  another  letter  tacked  on  to  it. 

In  putting  forth  this  book  I  have  to  render  my  best 
thanks  to  the  proprietors  of  the  Leicester  Journal  for 
their  kindness  in  allowing"  me  access  to  their  back  files  ; 
to  the  proprietors  of  Baity  s  Magazine  for  permission  to 
reprint  "The  Dream  of  an  Old  Meltonian,"  and  to  my 
friends,  Mr.  E.  Penton  and  Mr.  W.  F.  Boulton,  for  the 
valuable  assistance  they  have  rendered. 

London,  November  1898. 


PUBLISHER'S   NOTE 

The  hand- coloured  plates  and  other  illustrations, 
all  after  Henry  Alken,  are  among  the  best  and 
most  spirited  of  his  drawings.  They  depict  runs 
and  other  incidents  in  the  Quorn  country. 


TABLE    OF    MASTERS,    HUNTSMEN, 
AND    WHIPPERS-IN 


jl 

Year. 

Master. 

Huntsman. 

Whipper-in. 

Mr.  Boothby  (died  1752) 

1753  1 

Mr.    Meynell  (no  par- 

1775 S 

ticulars) 

1776 

Mr.  Meynell 

John  Raven 

|.  Jones 

1777  ) 
1797  | 

" 

" 

1798 

)? 

,, 

J.  Harrison 

1800  / 
1S04  \ 

Lord  Sefton 

\  J.  Raven 
j  S.  Goodall 

J.  Harrison 
T.  Wingfield 

1805 

Lord  Foley 

J.  Harrison 

(  T.  Wingfield 
1  Dick  Burton 

1S06  J 
1817  | 

Mi.  Assheton  Smith 

Himself 

|  T.  Day 
V  J.  Harrison 

1817  j 
1S20  \ 

Mr.  Osbaldeston 

Himself 

(  Tom  Sebright 
|  T.  Stevens 

1821 

Sir  Bellingham  Graham 

1822 

" 

J  Dick  Burton 

1823 

Mr.  Osbaldeston 

Himself 

\  T.  Day 

1824  ) 

Dick  Burton 

1826  ( 

" 

1827 

Lord  Southampton 

Dick  Burton 

Will  Derry 

1828 

SJ 

,, 

,, 

1829 

,, 

G.  Mountford 

\  Will  Derry 
(  George  Beers 

1830 

») 

j? 

., 

1831 

1832 
1833 

Sir  Harry  Goodricke 

» 

■• 

Mr.  Holyoake 

,, 

1834 

?  ? 

,, 

1835 

Mr.  Rowland  Errington 

,, 

1836 

\  Will  Derry 

" 

" 

/  Tom  Ball 

1837 

)  ? 

,, 

?3 

1S3S 

Lord  Suffield 

C.  Treadwell 

T.  Adamson 

1839 

Mr.  T.  Hodgson 

Webb 

1840 

>  5 

Tom  Day 

1841J 

1846  \ 

Mr.  Greene 

" 

1847  I 

Sir  Richard  Sutton 

I  J.  Morgan      / 
(  R.  Robinson  \ 

Ben  Morgan  ' 

1856 

Lord  Stamford 

Benj.  Boothroyd 

j  Samuel  Bacon 
|  James  Maiden 

1857 

" 

John  Treadwell 

i  Samuel  Bacon 
/  William  Martin 
J  Dan  Berkshire 

185S 

" 

11 

/  George  Pickhard 

1859 

" 

•• 

I  James  Macbride 

i860 

" 

/  James  Batsford 
j  James  Macbride 

1 86 1 

■• 

" 

/  James  Young 

1862 

,, 

,, 

1S63 

Mr.  J.  W.  Clowes 

John  Goddard 

(James  Macbride 
(Thomas  Firr 

1  For  part  of  the  time. 


TABLE    OF    MASTERS,    ETC. 


Year. 

Master. 

1 
Huntsman. 

Whippeis-In. 

1864 

Mr.  J.  W.  Clowes 

John  Coddard 

1  James  Macbride 
(  Edwin  Summers 
(  James  Macbride 

1865 

" 

" 

(  William  Snaith 

(  Philip  Tocock 

j  Stephen  Winkworth 

1866 

Marquis  of  Hastings 

Charles  Pike 

1867 

>> 

Thomas  Wilson 

J.  Hollins 
(  C.  Jones 

{  The  Master  and 

\  John  Machin 

1868 

Mr.  J.  C.  Musters 

\    Frank  Gillard 

(  John  Goddard,  jun. 

1869 

Frank  Gillard 

,, 

1S70 

Mr.  J.  Coupland 

James  Macbride 

{  Thomas  Wiggins 

j  F.  Payne 

^  Thomas  Wiggins 

1871 

?  > 

j) 

|  Robert  Smethurst 

1872 

>> 

Tom  Firr 

55 

{  George  Gillson 

1873 

>> 

)> 

|  Robert  Smethurst 

1874 

>> 

5> 

>5 

J  George  Gillson 

1875 

" 

>» 

j  William  Webb 
William  Wells 

1876 

» 

)> 

|  William  Wilson 

1877 

>) 

)> 

1  Edward  Haynes 

1878 

) ) 

J) 

(  William  Spiller 
{  Edward  Haynes 

1879 

j» 

" 

(  Berry  Cassell 
i  George  Cotterill 

18S0 

" 

>> 

(  Charles  Smith 
i  George  Cotterill 

1881 

)? 

>) 

j  Alfred  Earp 
(  Charles  Jones 

1882 

>> 

)> 

\  Alfred  Earp 

j  Charles  Curtis 

18S3 

" 

I) 

|  Alfred  Earp 
\  Alfred  Earp 

1884 

Lord  Manners 

)> 

|  G.  Beams 
i  Alfred  Earp 

1885 

" 

" 

|  Steven  Burtenshaw 
\  Alfred  Earp 

1886 

Captain  Warner 

)) 

(  Robert  Brown 

1887 

5> 

5  J 

\  Alfred  Earp 

1 888 

)> 

>) 

|  William  West 

1889 

(    Captain  Warner  and     ) 
j       Mr.  W.  B.  Paget         ( 

)) 

^  Alfred  Earp 

1890 

)> 

|  William  Capell 

i  Alfred  Earp 

1891 

" 

J  J 

1  Thomas  Parker 

1892 

,, 

)' 

!> 

1893 

Earl  of  Lonsdale 

)> 

)) 

I  Alfred  Earp 

1894 

» 5 

)) 

1  Walter  Keyte 

1895 

)) 

>) 

)> 

1896 

») 

" 

>> 

1897 

" 

a 

\  T.  Gabbetis 

1898 

Captain  E.  B.  Hartopp 

" 

(  Walter  Keyte 

CONTENTS 


CHAPTER  I 

THE  QUORN  COUNTRY— MELTON   MOWBRAY— QUORN 
KENNELS— QUORN  HOUNDS. 

The  Early  Quorn  Country,  3.  Boundaries  in  days  of  Messrs.  Boothby 
and  Meynell,  4.  Atherstone  and  Donington  portions,  4.  Unfair 
hunting  of  the  country,  5.  Hunting  the  Donington  side,  5.  Third 
Marquis  of  Hastings,  5.  Lord  Ferrers's  country,  6.  The  Harborough 
side  and  Mr.  Sutton,  7.  Quorn  dispute,  8,  9.  Melton  Mowbray,  10. 
Mr.  Ralph  Lambton,  10.  Quorndon  Club,  10.  Old  Club,  11.  New  and 
Lord  Rokeby's  Clubs,  11.  Lord  Alvanley  and  his  top-boots,  12.  His 
remark  to  Lord  Foley,  12.  Melton  hotels  of  old,  13.  Marquis  of 
Waterford,  12.  Scarlet  dress-coats,  14.  Midnight  steeplechase,  15. 
"Pulpit  utterances"  on,  16.  Sunday  horse-clothing,  16.  An  autocratic 
stud-groom,  17.  Larking  home,  18.  Dream  of  an  old  Meltonian,  18. 
Quorn  kennels,  23.  Mr.  Meynell's  first,  23.  At  Quorndon  Hall,  24. 
At  Humberstone  Gate,  24.  At  Thrussington,  24.  At  Billesdon,  24. 
Description  of  Quorn  kennels,  25.  Quorn  hounds,  27.  Mr.  Boothby's, 
27.  Mr.  Meynell's  and  Lord  Sefton's,  27.  Queer'em  and  Quornite,  28. 
Mr.  Assheton  Smith's,  28.  Hounds  of  Mr.  Musters,  Mr.  Osbaldeston, 
Sir  Bellingham  Graham,  and  Lord  Southampton,  28.  Lord  Suffield's, 
Mr.  Hodgson's,  Sir  Richard  Sutton's,  and  Lord  Stamford's  hounds,  29. 
The  Craven  hounds  bought  by  Mr.  Coupland,  30.  The  Quorn  hounds 
bought  for  the  country,  30.     Quorn  Alfred  and  Watchman,  31. 


CHAPTER  II 

MR.  BOOTHBY  AND  MR.   MEYNELL 

An  ideal  hunting  country,  35.  Vale  of  Cashmere,  35.  An  Easter  Monday 
hunt,  6.  Mr.  Boothby,  37.  Charnwood  Forest,  37.  Mr.  Boothby's 
horn,  38.  Pattern  of  horns,  40.  Boothby  family  and  racing,  41.  Mrs. 
Boothby,  41.  Prince  Boothby's  suicide,  42.  Mr.  Meynell  buys  Quorn- 
don Hall,  43.     Cock-fighting,  43.     Ball  at  Quorndon,  44.     Theatricals, 


xii  CONTENTS 

44.  Mr.  MeynelFs  first  marriage,  45.  "  Cork-legged  Jones's''  diary,  and 
Mr.  Hawkes's  "  Meynellian  Science,"  46.  Subscribers  to  the  Quorn,  47. 
Dr.  Ford,  47.  Mr.  Meynell  in  the  field  and  his  sayings,  47,  48.  Mr. 
MeynelFs  hound-breeding,  49  ;  studs,  49.  Mr.  Meynell  as  a  horse- 
man, 49,  50,  51.  John  Raven,  51.  Mr.  Meynell  on  rabies,  52.  Royalty 
with  the  Quorn,  53,  54.  Billesdon  Coplow  run  and  poem,  55.  Mr. 
Meynell  gives  up  hounds,  63.  Mr.  MeynelFs  correct  ear,  64.  "The 
Flying  Cucumber,'"'  64.     Harvey's  sauce,  65.     Death  of  Mr.  Meynell,  66. 


CHAPTER  III 

LORD  SEFTON,  LORD  FOLEY,  AND  MR.  ASSHETON  SMITH 

The  second  Lord  Sefton,  71.  Good  Friday,  1800,  71.  A  pack  with  two 
huntsmen,  72.  Goodall  and  Raven,  72,  73.  Raven's  death,  7^.  Lord 
Sefton's  hunters,  73.  His  riding,  74.  Curious  carriage,  75.  The 
Greville  Memoirs  on  Lord  Sefton,  75.  Joe  Harrison,  75.  A  run,  76. 
Second  horses,  77.  Sport  and  foxes  in  the  Quorn  country,  78.  Lord 
Jersey  has  a  Derby  winner  as  a  hunter,  79.  Famous  riders,  80.  Parisian 
sportsmen,  80.  Lord  Foley's  share  in  the  hounds,  81.  Lord  Foley, 
master,  and  buys  Quorndon  Hall,  82.  His  accident,  82.  Advertising 
fixtures,  83.  Lord  Foley  resigns,  84.  Sale  of  his  Worcestershire  pro- 
perty, 84.  Mr.  Assheton  Smith's  published  life,  85.  Anecdotes,  86.  Mr. 
Smith's  riding  and  hunting,  87.  George  Carter,  senior,  on  Mr.  Smith, 
88.     Buys  Mr.  Musters's  hounds,  89.     A  run,  89.     Time  and  distance, 

90.  Mr.  Smith's  sayings,  90,  91.     Mr.  White  and  Mr.  Smith  at  a  fence, 

91.  "Hunter  pairs,"  91.  Mr.  Smith's  subscription,  92.  Sir  Francis 
Burdett,  92.  Marquis  of  Tavistock,  92.  Tom  Heycock,  92,  93,  94.  One 
of  Mr.  Smith's  leaps,  93.  "  Leicestershire  White,"  94.  Joe  Maiden,  94. 
Claret  Lodge,  95.     Mr.  Smith's  death,  96.     The  Melton  Hunt,  97. 


CHAPTER  IV 

MR.    OSBALDESTON,    SIR    BELLINGHAM    GRAHAM,   AND 
LORD  SOUTHAMPTON 

Mr.  Osbaldeston,  account  of,  103.  As  a  huntsman,  104,  105.  Mr. 
Grantley  Berkeley's  criticism,  105.  The  hound  Furrier,  106.  A  pack 
by  Furrier,  106.  The  hound  Vaulter,  107.  Muteness  of  pack,  107. 
Increased  subscription,  108.  Exaggerated  runs,  108.  Lord  Plymouth, 
108.  Costly  horses,  109.  The  stoutest  horse  in  Leicestershire,  109. 
The  Duke  of  Wellington  in  Leicestershire,  109.  "  Davie  Baird  on  Jamie 
Hope,"  no.     John  Gully's  horse,  Jack  Ketch,  111.     The  Squire  dislikes 


CONTENTS  xiii 

timber,  in.  His  fall  with  Lord  Anson's  hounds,  1 12.  Mr.  Osbaldeston 
takes  the  Hampshire  country  and  returns  to  Quorn,  112.  A  good  run, 
ii"  Hounds  stopped  because  overridden,  113.  Dick  Burton,  114. 
«  Georgium  Sidus,"  114.  "  Assheton,"  114.  "  The  Flying  Parson,"  115. 
Mr.  Osbaldeston's  death,  115.  Sir  Bellingham  Graham,  countries 
hunted  by  him,  116.  His  riding,  117.  The  horse  Cock  Robin,  118. 
Tot  Inchley,  118.  Proposed  pack  of  staghounds,  119-  Accident  to  Sir 
Bellingham  Graham,  120.  Lord  Southampton,  121.  Scarcity  of  foxes, 
121.  "  Importation  of  foxes,"  122.  Lord  Southampton  gets  together  a 
pack  of  hounds,  122.  Dick  Burton  appointed  huntsman,  123.  Accident 
to  Burton,  123.  Jumps  a  gate  on  Lord  Rancliffe's  galloway,  124.  Big 
horses  v.  little  horses,  124.  A  great  run,  124.  Lord  Southampton's 
hound  van,  124.  Colonel  Russell's  big  leap,  125.  Money  circulated  by 
hunting  men,  125.  Lord  Southampton  buys  the  Oakley  hounds,  126. 
George  Mountford  becomes  huntsman,  126.  Sport  with  the  Quorn, 
127.  Kirby  Gate,  128.  Hunting  dress,  129.  Humberstone  kennels, 
129.  Description  of  Quorndon  Hall,  130.  Good  run,  131.  The  horse 
Segar,  132.  "Melton  in  1830,"  verses,  133-  Resignation  of  Lord 
Southampton,  139. 


CHAPTER  V 

SIR    HARRY   GOODRICKE,    MR.    HOLYOAKE   GOODRICKE, 
AND  MR.  ROWLAND  ERRINGTON 

Sir  Harry  Goodricke  succeeds  Lord  Southampton,  143-  Builds  new  kennels 
at  Thrussington,  143.  A  dinner  at  Melton,  144-  Melton  Song,  144- 
Young  Goodricke  and  the  King,  145.  Sir  Harry  a  good  and  popular 
sportsman,  147.  Buys  the  hounds  of  Lord  Petre  and  Mr.  Shaw,  148. 
The  Old  Club,  148.  Ladies  hunting  with  the  Quorn,  149.  Mountford's 
illness,  149.  Runs,  150.  Foxes'  skeletons  in  a  drain,  150.  Melton 
studs,  151.  Lord  Alvanley,  151.  Sir  Harry  Goodricke  as  a  horseman, 
151,  '152.  His  death,  153.  Mr.  Holyoake  Goodricke  succeeds  Sir 
Harry,  154.  Woodcock  shooting  and  hunting,  155.  Good  run,  155. 
Mr.  James  Ellar,  156.  His  accident,  157.  Mr.  Ellar  and  Lord  Rancliffe, 
158.  Buttress  the  runner,  158.  Quorn  hounds  meet  at  Belvoir  by  in- 
vitation, 159.  Mr.  Holyoake  Goodricke  as  a  sportsman,  160,  161.  Mr. 
Rowland  Errington  succeeds  to  the  Mastership,  162.  Chairman  at  a 
dinner,  163.  Charles  Payne,  163.  Early  cub-hunting,  164.  Mr.  Erring- 
ton's  three  packs,  164.  The  Duke  of  Wellington  in  Leicestershire,  165. 
The  Hunt  Ball,  166.  Sir  Francis  Grant  paints  "The  Melton  Hunt 
Breakfast,"  166.  No  Irishman  in  the  picture,  167.  "The  Meltonians" 
at  Drury  Lane,  167,  168.  Description  of  hunting  in  Blackwood's  Maga- 
zine, 169.  Mr.  Errington's  last  season,  170.  Sells  his  hounds  to  Lord 
Chesterfield,  170. 


xiv  CONTENTS 

CHAPTER  VI 

LORD    SUFFIELD    AND    MR.    THOMAS    HODGSON 

Lord  Suffield  takes  the  Quorn  country,  175.  Keeps  race-horses,  175.  Lord 
Gardner  in  the  "  Chaunt  of  Achilles,"  176.  Lord  Suffield  buys  the 
Lambton  hounds,  177.  Lord  Suffield  and  Lord  Gardner  live  at 
Lowesby  Hall,  177.  Builds  new  kennels  at  Billesdon,  178.  Lord 
Suffield  and  his  stud-groom,  178.  Prizes  for  farmers,  179.  Mr.  Tilbury 
in  a  run,  180.  Good  run  from  Kirby  Gate,  181.  Resignation  of  Lord 
Suffield,  181.  Sale  of  horses  and  hounds,  182.  Meeting  of  covert 
owners,  183.  Mr.  Hodgson  comes  from  the  Holderness  to  become 
Master  of  the  Quorn,  184.  Webb  as  huntsman,  185.  Tom  Day  suc- 
ceeds him  after  one  season,  186.  Mr.  Hodgson  in  love,  187.  His 
hunting-dress,  188.  The  Quorn  and  Donington  hounds,  188.  Runs, 
188,  189.  Dick  Christian's  leap,  190.  Lord  Harborough's  objection  to 
hounds,  190.  Remarks  on  Lord  Gardner,  191.  Mr.  Assheton  Smith 
brings  his  hounds  to  Leicestershire,  191.  Prince  Ernest  of  Saxe-Coburg 
one  of  the  field,  191.  The  sport  of  the  day,  193.  Marquis  of  Water- 
ford's  staghounds,  193,  194.  A  German  Baron  in  Leicestershire,  194. 
Mr.  Rowland,  the  veterinary  surgeon,  195.  Good  run,  196.  Resigna- 
tion of  Mr.  Hodgson,  197.  His  sale,  197,  198.  Sir  Tatton  Sykes  and 
Mr.  Gully,  198.  Mr.  Hodgson  becomes  a  Registrar  in  Yorkshire,  199. 
Death  of  Mr.  Hodgson,  199. 


CHAPTER  VII 

MR.    HENRY    GREENE 

Mr.  Greene  the  only  Leicestershire  Master  of  the  Quorn  since  Mr.  Boothby, 
203.  His  hounds  and  horses,  204.  Kirby  Gate,  204.  Mr.  Greene's 
hounds  and  horsemanship,  205,  206.  December  runs,  206,  207.  Acci- 
dent to  Mr.  Greene,  208.  "Venator"  on  the  Quorn  Hunt,  209.  Hunt- 
ing map,  210.  Sir  Watkin  Wynn  in  Leicestershire,  210.  The  Duke  of 
Cambridge  and  the  Quorn,  211.  Hollow  coverts,  211.  The  Due  de 
Nemours  in  Leicestershire,  211.  The  Queen  visits  Belvoir  and  Melton, 
211.  Accident  to  Lord  Wilton  and  death  of  Mr.  Knight,  212.  Sir 
Francis  Burdett's  first  hunting,  212.  Death  of  Mr.  John  Moore,  213. 
Clashing  of  the  Quorn  and  Mr.  Musters's  hounds,  214.  Benjamin 
Fouldes,  215.  Sir  Richard  Sutton  takes  the  Quorn  hounds,  216. 
Death  of  Mr.  Greene,  216.  A  nobleman's  portrait  sold  for  tenpence, 
217. 


CONTENTS  xv 

CHAPTER   VIII 

SIR    RICHARD    SUTTON 

Sir  Richard  Sutton's  hounds,  221.  The  money  he  spent  on  hunting,  222. 
Dinner  at  Melton,  222.  First  Sunday  in  November  at  Melton,  223.  Sir 
James  Musgrave  and  friend,  223.  A  hunting-field  scrimmage,  224. 
He  "hangs  a  good  boot,"  224.  Sir  Richard's  questions  to  his  second 
horseman,  225.  A  "wretched  memory  for  hounds,"  225.  Ben  Morgan, 
225,  226.  Dick  Webster,  226.  A  fog,  228.  Shooting  a  fox  before 
hounds,  227.  Money  circulated  by  hunting-men,  228.  Runs,  228,  229, 
230.  Mr.  Little  Gilmour,  231.  Sir  Richard  Sutton  charged  with  buy- 
ing foxes,  231.  Kirby  Gate,  232.  Death  of  Mr.  Glossop,  233.  Rail- 
ways, 234.  Mr.  Cradock  defends  Sir  R.  Sutton  on  charge  of  damage, 
234.  Death  of  Lord  Rancliffe,  235.  Tower  near  Bunny  Hall,  235. 
Good  run,  235,  236.  Captain  Campbell,  237.  Sir  R.  Sutton  gives 
Harborough  side  to  his  son  Richard,  238.  Run,  238,  239.  Duchess  of 
Cambridge  and  daughter  visit  Lord  and  Lady  Wilton,  239.  Vulpicide, 
239.  Sir  Richard  Sutton's  presentation  portrait,  240.  An  unlucky 
family,  240.     Sudden  death  of  Sir  Richard  Sutton,  241.    Family  history, 

241,  242.     Sir  Richard  as  a  shot,  242.     Sir  Richard  on  stag-hunting, 

242,  243.     Jem  Shirley,  243.     Horse  and  hound  sales,  244.     Hunting 
the  Quorn  country,  244,  245. 


CHAPTER  IX 

EARL   OF   STAMFORD   AND    WARRINGTON 

Mr.  Story  seeks  Lord  Stamford,  249.  Lord  Stamford  agrees  to  be  Master 
of  the  Quorn,  250.  Lives  at  Bradgate  Park,  250.  Mr.  Warner  buys 
Quorndon  Hall,  leasing  stables  and  kennels  to  Lord  Stamford,  250. 
Early  life,  250,  251.  Buys  some  hounds,  251.  Ben  Boothroyd  hunts- 
man, Bacon  and  Maiden  whippers-in,  251.  Opening  day  Asfordby 
instead  of  Kirby  Gate,  252.  The  Rector  of  Asfordby,  252.  Accident 
to  huntsman,  252.  Boothroyd  succeeded  by  John  Treadwell,  253. 
Assheton  Smith  on  "  Ayston,"  253.  Curious  death  of  a  horse,  255. 
Studs  at  Melton,  255.  The  Hunt  warned  off.  255.  Mr.  Richards,  the 
stockinger,  256.  Runs,  257.  Challenge  to  ride  by  Lady  Stamford  con- 
tradicted, 257.  The  female  blacksmith,  257.  Epitaph  on  blacksmith, 
258.    Runs,  258,  259.    Death  of  Lord  Jersey  and  Marquis  of  Waterford, 

260.  Notice  of  Lord  Waterford,  260.     Dick  Christian  on  "  Lord  Grey," 

261.  Lady  Harborough  throws  open  Stapleford  to  the  hounds,  262.  Ac- 
cident to  Mr.  Bullen  of  Eastwell,  262.  Amateur  theatricals  at  Melton, 
263.     Return  to  Melton  of  Count  Batthyany,  265.     Death  of  Mr.  Lyne 


xvi  CONTENTS 

Stephens,  265.  Illness  and  threatened  resignation  of  Lord  Stamford, 
265,  266.  Accident  to  the  Honourable  A.  Coventry,  266.  Testimonial 
to  Lord  and  Lady  Stamford,  267.  Sir  Harry's  Gorse,  268.  Foxhound 
show  at  Yarm,  268.  Railways  and  hunting-men,  268.  Death  of  the 
Prince  Consort,  269.  Covert  funds,  269.  Unruly  fields,  270.  A  dropped 
£5  note,  271.  Bell-ringing  in  honour  of  hounds  meeting,  272.  Fox 
while  hunted  picks  up  rabbit,  272.  Death  of  Dick  Christian,  273. 
Treadwell  leaves  the  Quorn,  275.  His  death,  275.  Lord  Stamford 
gives  up  the  Quorn  and  sells  his  horses,  277.  Lord  Stamford  as  a 
cricketer  and  a  shot,  278,  279. 


CHAPTER   X 

MR.   CLOWES,    MARQUIS    OF   HASTINGS,   AND 
MR.   JOHN    CHAWORTH    MUSTERS 

Mr.  Clowes  buys  Lord  Stamford's  hounds,  283.  Unfavourable  hunting 
weather,  283,  284.  Failure  of  foxes,  284.  Wire-fencing,  285.  Mr. 
Lyne  Stephens's  stables,  285.  Mr.  Bromley  Davenport  in  Leicester- 
shire, 286.  A  run,  286.  A  farmer  on  hunting-men,  287.  Accident  to 
Mr.  Bromley  Davenport,  287.  A  hoax  concerning  accident  to  "  Sir  B. 
Hichens,"  288.  The  first  Grand  National  Steeplechase,  288,  289. 
The  last  of  the  four  M's,  289.  Results  of  the  season  1863-64,  289. 
A  Leicestershire  Grand  National,  290.  Mr.  Clowes  stopped  by  a 
farmer,  290,  291.  Dinner  and  testimonial  to  Mr.  Clowes,  291.  Sale  of 
the  hounds,  293.     The  Marquis  of  Hastings  hunts  the  Quorn  country, 

294.  His  hound  purchases,  295.    Walton  Thorns  and  Lord  A.  St.  Maur, 

295.  Runs,  296,  297,  298.  The  Quorn  and  Belvoir  hounds  clash,  297. 
Horse  and  hound  show  at  Birmingham,  298.  Wilson  replaces  Pike  as 
huntsman,  and  removal  of  the  kennels  to  Donington,  3C0.  Mr.  Sothern 
with  the  Quorn,  300,  301.  Resignation  of  the  Marquis  of  Hastings, 
301.  Mr.  Musters,  302.  Death  of  Roger  Onions,  the  whipper-in,  303. 
Mr.  Clowes  and  Mr.  Frewen  in  connection  with  the  representation  of 
North  Leicestershire,  304.  Frank  Gillard  becomes  huntsman,  305. 
Mr.  Musters's  three  huntsmen,  305.  Accident  to  Lord  Wilton,  306.  Life 
of  John  Goddard,  306.  Management  of  the  coverts,  307.  Mr.  Musters's 
horsemanship,  307.  Studs  at  Melton,  308.  Presentation  to  Mr.  Musters 
by  the  earth-stoppers,  308.  A  rector's  remarks  on  hunting,  309.  Re- 
sults of  the  season  1869-70.  310.  Retirement  of  Mr.  Musters  and  the 
sale  of  his  horses,  310,  311. 


CONTENTS  xvii 

CHAPTER    XI 

MR.    COUPLAND 

Mr.  Coupland  establishes  hounds  in  Bombay,  315.  Buys  Craven  hounds, 
315.  A  member  of  the  Coaching  Club,  and  runs  steeplechasers,  316. 
Frank  Gillard  as  huntsman,  316.  Sale  of  Mr.  Musters's  horses,  317. 
Mr.  Coupland  institutes  puppy  shows  at  Quorn,  317.  Puppy  walking, 
317.  Swimming  the  Wreake,  318,  319.  Annual  sale  of  horses,  319. 
Visit  of  Prince  of  Wales,  320.  Prince  of  Wales's  Covert,  330.  Mr.  Coup- 
land  and  the  jibbing  pony,  321.  Death  of  Master  C.  C.  H.  Webster,  321. 
Death  of  Joseph  Hobson,  322.  The  "twice  accursed"  Midland  Rail- 
way, 322.  Death  of  Lord  Chesterfield,  323.  Clashing  of  Quorn  and 
Mr.  Musters's  hounds,  323,  324.  Death  of  Will  Derry,  324.  Melton 
Mowbray  pork-pies,  324.  Accident  to  Lady  Ida  Hope,  324.  Abolition 
of  the  toll-bar  at  Kirby  Gate,  325.  Hunting  on  wheels,  325.  Foreign 
visitors  to  Melton  Mowbray,  326.  A  runaway  pack,  326,  327.  Tom 
Firr  becomes  huntsman,  327.  Prince  of  Wales  attends  Melton  Steeple- 
chases, 328.  Deaths  of  Lord  Hopetoun  and  the  Hon.  H.  Coventry, 
329.  Payment  of  earth-stoppers,  329.  Earth-stoppers'  dinner,  330. 
Hound  show  at  Harrogate,  330.  Presentation  to  Mr.  Coupland  by 
earth-stoppers,  331.  Accident  to  Tom  Firr,  331.  Crossing  a  bridge, 
331,  332.  Riding  on  the  railway-line,  332,  333.  The  covert  fund  ques- 
tion, 333.  Death  of  Lord  Rossmore,  333.  A  hunting  Ritualist,  334. 
The  Great  Yorkshire  Hound  Show,  334.  The  Empress  of  Austria  at 
Melton,  334.  Death  of  Lord  Forester,  335.  Death  of  Mrs.  Coupland, 
336.  Lord  Grey  de  Wilton  and  the  Melton  Canal  Company,  336.  A 
hard-riding  visitor,  336,  337.  Accident  to  Lord  Stamford,  337.  Popu- 
larity of  Mr.  Coupland,  337,  338.  Death  of  Mr.  Herrick,  338.  The 
Alexandra  Park  Hound  Show,  338.  Hound  show  at  Driffield,  339. 
Opening  of  the  Leicester  Horse  Repository,  340.  Accident  to  Firr,  340. 
Visit  of  the  Prince  of  Wales  to  Melton,  340,  341.  Hound  show  at 
Skipworth-in-Craven,  341.  Acting  upon  impulse,  341.  A  dead  horse 
and  a  dyed  one,  342.  The  Queen's  staghounds  visit  the  Cottesmore 
country,  342.  Hound  show  at  York,  343.  Colonel  Burnaby  and 
Leicestershire  old  soldiers,  343.  Scarcity  of  foxes,  344.  Empress  of 
Austria  in  Leicestershire,  and  accident  to  Lord  James  Douglas,  344. 
The  steeplechase  horse  "  Doctor,"  344,  345.  The  Rev.  John  Russell  at 
Kirby  Gate,  345.  A  horse  jumps  into  a  tobacconist's  shop,  345.  Death 
of  John  Goddard,  345.  Death  of  Mr.  Andrew  Heseltine,  346.  Report 
that  the  Duke  of  Portland  would  succeed  Mr.  Coupland,  347.  Protest 
against  advertising  fixtures,  347.  Death  of  Lord  Wilton,  347,  348,  349. 
Accident  to  Mr.  Musters,  349.  Presentation  to  Sir  A.  Hazelrigg, 
349.  Portrait  of  Firr,  349.  Quarrymen  mislead  a  hunting-man,  350. 
Hunt  picture,  350.  Death  of  General  Burnaby,  350.  Mr.  Trew  and 
the  Prince  of  Wales's  Gorse,  351.  Accident  to  Mr.  H.  Barclay,  352. 
Lord  Lonsdale  takes  his  hounds  from  Lincolnshire  to  Scraptoft  Hall, 
352.     Retirement  of  Mr.  Coupland,  353,  354. 

I? 


xviii  CONTENTS 


CHAPTER  XII 

LORD    MANNERS,   CAPTAIN    WARNER,   AND 
EARL  OF  LONSDALE 

Lord  Manners  wins  Grand  National,  357.  Clashing  of  Quorn  and  Belvoir, 
357)  358-  Bad  scenting  weather,  358.  Friday  fixtures  not  advertised, 
358.  Accident  to  Firr,  358.  Death  of  the  Rev.  E.  Bullen,  359.  Lord 
Manners  improves  Adam's  Gorse,  359.  An  accident  on  the  road,  360. 
Captain  Warner  takes  the  Quorn,  361.  Action  of  tenant  farmers,  361, 
362,  363.  Death  of  Captain  Ross,  363.  Firr  breaks  his  collar-bone. 
364.  Death  of  Mr.  Little  Gilmour,  364,  365.  A  bad  season,  366. 
Peterborough  Hound  Show,  366,  367.     A  run,  367.     An  unusual  line, 

368.  Death  of  Captain  Barclay,  368.     Death  of  brother  to  Gamecock, 

369.  Hounds  poisoned,  369.  Neutral  coverts,  370.  Accidents,  370,  372. 
Man-hunting  with  bloodhounds,  371.  A  run,  371.  Death  of  Mr.  G. 
Harvey,  372.  Resignation  of  Captain  Warner  and  Mr.  Paget,  373. 
Action  for  damages  against  Captain  Warner,  373,  374.  Tom  Firr's 
evidence,  374.  Lord  Lonsdale  asked  to  take  the  country,  375.  Kirby 
Gate  and  Gartree  Hill,  375.  Lord  Lonsdale's  list  of  farmers,  376. 
Death  of  Sir  Henry  des  Voeux,  376.  Lowesby  Hall  (verses),  277- 
Hounds  meet  at  Loughborough,  380,  381.  Melton  Hunt  Ball,  3S1. 
Lord  Lonsdale's  driving  feat,  382.  Presentation  to  Mr.  Cradock,  382. 
The  family,  383.  Retirement  of  Lord  Lonsdale  and  appointment  of 
Captain  E.  Burns  Hartopp,  385. 


INDEX 387 


LIST    OF    ILLUSTRATIONS 

Drawn    by    HENRY    ALKEN 

AND   COLOURED    BY    HAND 

I.  THE  MEET. — Let  us  suppose  ourselves  at  Ashby  Pasture,  in 
the  Quorn  Country,  with  Mr.  Osbaldeston's  hounds. — Let  us 
indulge  ourselves  with  a  fine  morning,  in  the  first  week  of 
February,  and  at  least  two  hundred  well-mounted  men  by  the 
cover's  side. — Time  being  called — say  a  quarter-past  eleven, 
nearly  our  great-grandfathers'  dinner-hour  —  the  hounds 
approach   the  gorse Frontispiece 

II.  MAP  OF  THE  QUORN  AND  SURROUNDING 

COUNTRIES To  face  page  i 

III.  DRAWING  COVER.— "Hark  in,  hark!"  with  a  slight 
cheer,  and  perhaps  one  wave  of  his  cap,  says  Mr.  Osbaldes- 
ton,  and  in  an  instant  he  has  not  a  hound  at  his  horse's  heels. 
— In  a  very  short  time  the  gorse  appears  shaken  in  various 
parts  of  the  cover — apparently  from  an  unknown  cause,  not  a 
single  hound  being  for  some  minutes  visible.  Presently  one 
or  two  appear,  leaping  over  some  old  furze  which  they  cannot 
push  through,  and  exhibit  to  the  field  their  glossy  skins  and 
spotted  sides. — The  cover  shakes  more  than  ever.  Every 
stem  appears  alive,  and  it  reminds  us  of  a  cornfield  waving  in 
the  wind.  In  two  minutes  the  sterns  of  some  more  hounds 
are  seen  flourishing  above  the  gorse.  "  Have  at  him 
there  ! "  holloas  the  Squire — the  gorse  still  more  alive,  and 
hounds  leaping  over  each  other's  backs.  "  Have  at  him 
there  again — a  fox  for  a  hundred  ! "  reiterates  the  Squire, 
putting  his  finger  in  his  ear,  and  uttering  a  scream  which, 
not  being  set  to  music,  we  cannot  give  here. — Jack  Stevens 
looks  at  his  watch.  At  this  moment  "John  White,"  "Val. 
Maher,"  "  Frank  Holyoake,"  and  others  are  seen  creeping 
gently  on  towards  a  point  at  which  they  think  it  probable  he 
may  break,  and  Billy  Coke  comes  up  at  the  rate  of  thirty 
miles  an  hour  on  Advance,  with  a  label  pinned  on  his  back, 
"  He  kicks." — At  this  interesting  period  a  snob,  just  arrived 
from  a  very  rural  country,  and  unknown  to  any  one,  but  deter- 
mined to  witness  the  start,  gets  into  a  conspicuous  situation. 
"  Come  away,  sir  !  "  holloas  the  Master  ;  "  what  mischief  are 


xx  LIST    OF    ILLUSTRATIONS 

you  doing  there  ?  Do  you  think  YOU  can  catch  the  fox  ?" — A 
breathless  silence  ensues. — At  length  a  whimper  is  heard  in 
the  cover,  like  the  voice  of  a  dog  in  a  dream  :  it  is  Flourisher, 
and  the  Squire  cheers  him  to  the  echo.  In  an  instant  a 
hound  challenges — and  another — and  another.  'Tis  enough. 
"TALLY-HO  !"  cries  a  countryman  in  a  tree     .  To  face  page       48 

IV.  TALLY-HO  AND  AWAY.— "  He's  gone,"  exclaims  Lord 
Alvanley,  and  clapping  spurs  to  his  horse,  in  an  instant  is  in 
the  front  rank.  As  all  good  sportsmen  would  say,  "  Ware, 
hounds  ! "  cries  Sir  Harry  Goodricke.  "  Give  them  time," 
exclaims  Mr.  John  Moore.  "  That's  right,"  says  Mr.  Osbal- 
deston,  "  spoil  your  own  sport,  as  usual."  "  Go  along,"  roars 
out  Mr.  Holyoake,  "there  are  three  couple  of  hounds  on  the 
scent."  "That's  your  sort,"  says  Billy  Coke.  A  turn  and 
a  momentary  loss  of  scent  in  the  few  hounds  that  have  shot 
ahead,  joins  head  and  tail  together,  and  the  scent  being  good, 
every  hound  settles  to  his  fox  ;  the  pace  gradually  improves  ; 

VIRES  ACQUIRIT  EUNDO  ;  A  TERRIBLE  BURST  IS  THE 
RESULT To  face  page        96 

V.  THE  PACE  BEGINS  TO  TELL.— After  running  at  best 
pace  for  nineteen  minutes  the  hounds  come  to  a  fault,  and  for 
a  moment  the  fox  has  a  chance.  The  Squire  hits  him  off  like 
a  workman,  and  the  pack  again  settle  to  the  scent.  Some 
begin  to  show  symptoms  of  distress.  Two  horses  are  seen 
loose  in  the  distance,  a  report  is  flying  about  that  one  of  the 
field  is  badly  hurt,  and  something  is  heard  of  a  collar-bone 
being  broken,  others  say  it  is  a  leg ;  but  the  pace  is  TOO  GOOD 
to  inquire.  A  cracking  of  rails  is  now  heard,  and  one  gentle- 
man's horse  is  to  be  seen  resting,  nearly  balanced,  across  one 
of  them,  his  rider  being  on  his  back  in  the  ditch,  which  is  on 
the  landing  side.  "Who  is  he  ?"  says  Lord  Brudenell  to  Jack 
Stevens.  "Can't  tell,  my  lord  ;  but  I  thought  it  was  a  queerish 
place  when  I  came  o'er  it  before  him."  It  is  evidently  a  case 
of  peril,  but  the  pace  is  TOO  GOOD  to  afford  help      To  face  page     128 

VI.  "SNOB"  IS  BEAT— "Snob"  all  this  time  has  gone  quite  in 
the  first  flight,  and  is  here  in  the  best  of  company.  Wishing, 
however,  to  out-Herod  Herod,  and  to  have  a  fine  story  to  tell 
when  he  gets  home,  he  pushes  to  his  speed  on  ground  on 
which  all  Leicestershire  men  are  careful,  and  the  death- 
warrant  of  the  little  bay  horse  is  signed.  It  is  true,  he  gets 
first  to  the  gate,  and  has  no  idea  of  opening  it  ;  sees  it  con- 
tains five  new  and  strong  bars,  that  will  neither  bend  nor 
break  ;  has  a  great  idea  of  a  fall,  but  no  idea  of  refusing  ; 
presses  his  hat  firmly  on  his  head,  and  gets  his  whip-hand  at 
liberty  to  give  the  good  little  nag  a  refresher ;  but  all  at  once 
he  perceives  it  will  not  do.  When  attempting  to  collect  him 
for  the  effort,  he  finds  his  mouth  dead  and  his   neck   stiff; 


LIST    OF    ILLUSTRATIONS  xxi 

fancies  he  hears  something  like  a  wheezing  in  his  throat,  and, 
discovering  quite  unexpectedly  that  the  gate  would  open, 
places  the  hook  of  his  whip  under  the  latch,  just  as  John 
White  goes  over  it  close  to  the  hinge-post,  and  Captain  Ross, 
upon  Clinker,  follows  him  ....  Jo  face  page     160 

VII.  FULL  CRY,  SECOND  HORSES. —  Another  short  check 
enables  thirteen  men  out  of  two  hundred  to  get  their  second 
horses,  and  the  hounds  again  settle  to  the  scent  at  a  truly 
killing  pace.  "Hold  hard,  Holyoake!"  exclaims  Mr. 
Osbaldeston  (now  mounted  on  Blucher),  knowing  what 
double-quick  time  he  would  be  marching  to,  with  fresh  pipes 
to  play  upon,  and  the  crowd  well  shaken  off;  "pray  don't  press 
'em  too  hard,  and  we  shall  be  sure  to  kill  our  fox.  Have  at 
HIM  there,  Abigail  and  Fickle,  good  bitches — see  what  a 
head  they  are  carrying  !  I'll  bet  a  thousand  they  kill  him." 
The  country  appears  better  and  better.  "  He's  taking  a 
capital  line,"  exclaims  Sir  Harry  Goodricke.  "  Worth  a 
dozen  Reform  Bills,"  shouts  Sir  Francis  Burdett,  sitting  erect 
upon  Sampson,  and  putting  his  head  straight  at  a  yawner. 
"We  shall  have  the  Whissendine  brook,"  cries  Mr.  Maher, 
who  knows  every  field  in  the  country,  "for  he  is  making 
straight  for  Teigh."  "  And  a  bumper  too,  after  last  night's 
rain,"  holloas  Captain  Berkeley,  determined  to  get  first  to 
some  still  rails  in  a  corner.  "  So  much  the  better,"  says  Lord 
Alvanley  ;  "  I  like  a  bumper  at  all  times."  "  A  fig  for  the 
Whissendine,"  cries  Lord  Gardner  ;  "  I  am  on  the  best 
water-jumper  in  my  stable"       ....  To  face  page     192 

VIII.  THE  WHISSENDINE  APPEARS  IN  VIEW.— The  pro- 
phecy turns  up.  Having  skirted  Kanksborough  gorse,  the 
villain  has  nowhere  to  stop  short  of  Woodwell  Head  cover, 
and  in  ten  minutes,  or  less,  the  brook  appears  in  view.  Six 
men,  out  of  twelve,  take  it  in  their  stride  ;  three  stop  short, 
their  horses  refusing  the  first  time,  but  come  well  over  the 
second  ;  and  three  find  themselves  in  the  middle  of  it.  The 
gallant  "Frank  Forester"  is  among  the  latter;  and  having 
been  requested  that  morning  to  wear  a  friend's  new  coat,  to 
take  off  the  gloss  and  glare  of  the  shop,  he  accomplishes  the 
task  to  perfection  in  the  bluish-black  mud  of  the  Whissendine, 
only  then  subsiding  after  a  three  days'  flood.  "  Who  is  that 
under  his  horse  in  the  brook  ? "  inquires  that  good  sportsman 
and  fine  rider,  Mr.  Green  of  Rolleston,  whose  noted  old  mare 
had  just  skimmed  over  the  water  like  a  swallow  on  a  summer's 
evening.  "  Only  Dick  Christian,"  answers  Lord  Forester, 
"and  it  is  nothing  new  to  him."  "But  he'll  be  drowned," 
exclaims  Lord  Kinnaird.  "  I  shouldn't  wonder,"  observes 
Mr.  Coke.     But  the  pace  is  too  good  to  inquire        To  face  page     240 


xxii  LIST    OF    ILLUSTRATIONS 

IX.  THE  DEATH. — The  yEneid  of  Virgil  ends  with  a  death,  and 
a  chase  is  not  complete  without  it.  The  fox  dies  within  half  a 
mile  of  Woodwell  Head,  evidently  his  point  from  the  first ; 
the  pack  pulling  him  down  in  the  middle  of  a  large  grass 
field,  every  hound  but  one  at  his  brush.  Jack  Stevens  with 
him  in  his  hands  would  be  a  subject  worthy  of  Edwin  Land- 
seer  himself :  a  black-thorn,  which  has  laid  hold  of  his  cheek, 
has  besmeared  his  upper  garments  with  blood,  and  one  side 
of  his  head  and  cap  are  cased  in  mud,  by  a  fall  he  has  had  in 
a  lane,  his  horse  having  alighted  in  the  ruts  from  a  high  flight 
of  rails  ;  but  he  has  ridden  the  same  horse  throughout  the 
run,  and  has  handled  him  so  well,  he  could  have  gone  two 
miles  farther,  if  the  chase  had  been  continued  so  long. — 
Osbaldeston's  who-hoop  might  have  been  heard  to  Cottesmore 
had  the  wind  set  in  that  direction,  and  every  man  present  is 
ecstatic  with  delight.  "  Quite  the  cream  of  the  thing,"  says 
Lord  Gardner.  "  The  cream  of  everything  in  the  shape  of 
fox-hunting,"  observes  that  excellent  sportsman  Sir  James 
Musgrave,  looking  at  that  moment  at  his  watch.  "Just  ten 
miles,  as  the  crow  flies,  in  one  hour  and  ten  minutes,  with 
but  two  trifling  checks,  over  the  finest  country  in  the  world." 
"What  superb  hounds  are  these  !"  added  the  baronet, 
as  he  turned  his  horse's  head  to  the  wind.  "You  are  right," 
says  Colonel  Lowther,  "  they  are  perfect.  I  wish  my  father 
had  seen  them  do  their  work  to-day." — Some  of  the  field  now 
come  up  who  could  not  live  in  the  first  flight  ;  but  as  there  is 
no  jealousy  here,  they  congratulate  each  other  on  the  fine  day's 
.  sport,  and  each  man  turns  his  head  towards  home     To  face  page     272 

X.  THE  MEETING.     Kirby  Gate.— Childers  Inn.     Kirby  Toll 

Gate.    Sir  F.  Burdett's  House.    Melton  Mowbray     To  face  page     304 

XI.  BREAKING  COVER.  Billesdon  Coplow.— Galby.  Billes- 
don  Coplow.  Houghton.  Botany  Bay  Cover.  Scrap  Toft 
Spinney.  Heyham.  Ingersby  Spinney.  Hungerton.  Barkby 
Holt.     Quonby  Hall To  face  page     304 

XII.  FULL  CRY.  Wissendine  Pasture.— The  Cover.  Wissen- 
dine  Brook.  Freeby  Wood.  Waltham  Stonesby.  Buck- 
minster.     Wymondham.     Wissendine     .         .         To  face  page     336 

XIII.  THE  DEATH.  View  of  Kettleby.— Mr.  Crosse's  House. 
Great  Home  Close.  Kettleby  Church.  Road  to  Melton. 
Bilsdon  Coplow  ......  To  face  page     336 


LIST    OF    ILLUSTRATIONS  xxiii 

TAIL    PIECES 

Drawn  by  Henry  Alken 

TAGE 

i.  Full  Cry  !....■ 9 

2.  Spree  at  Melton  Mowbray  ;  or,  Doing  the  Thing  in  a 

Sportsman-like  Manner.  Anno  Domini  1837.  Quick  Work 
without  a  Contract,  by  Tip-Top  Sawyers 22 

"  If  it  were  done,  when  'tis  done,  then  'twere  well  it  were  done  quickly." 

—Shakespeare. 

"Coming  it  strong  with  a  spree  and  a  spread, 
Milling  the  daylights  or  cracking  a  head  ; 
Go  it,  ye  cripples  !  come  tip  us  your  mauleys, 
Up  with  the  lanthorns,  and  down  with  the  Charleys." 

3.  Drawing  a  Cover 31 

4.  The  Master  taking  the  Gate 67 

5.  All  the  Difference.     Not  used  to  it.    Used  to  it  .        .  100 

6.  A  Check  ;  or,  The  Misery  of  a  Nailed-up  Gate       .        .  140 

7.  Spree  at  Melton  Mowbray.    Larking  at  the  Grantham 

Toll-Gate  ;  or,  Coming  in  for  the  Brush  !  A  Society 
of  Distinguished  Painters,  who  hunt  with  Fox-hounds,  live  splen- 
didly, and  only  paint  at  Night 171 

"  They  left  no  man's  sign,  name,  or  calling 
Untouched  by  something  most  appalling." 

8.  The   Return    Home.      Discretion  the   Better   Part  of 

Valour 217 

9.  Death  of  the  "Varmint" 245 

10.  Crowding  at  a  Gap;  or,  Who  shall  be  First?  .        .        .279 

n.  A  Morning  Refresher 293 

12.  A  Stable  at  Melton  Mowbray 311 


MAP  OF  THE    0  IIP  EH  All!)  sflfllROIfirinrffl    OOlJtnT .'  ''+:'■ 


^mmmm  ?n 


CHAPTER  I 

THE  QUORN  COUNTRY: ITS  HOUNDS 
AND  KENNELS 

MELTON  MOWBRAY 

THE  QUORN  KENNELS 

THE  QUORN  HOUNDS 


CHAPTER    I 

THE    QUORN    COUNTRY:    ITS    HOUNDS 
AND    KENNELS 

THE  boundaries  of  hunting  countries  are  ever 
changing,  and  hunting  geography  is  exceedingly 
difficult  to  learn  thoroughly,  as  the  old  Boodle's  Com- 
mittee and  the  present  Masters  of  Foxhounds'  Associa- 
tion could  tell  us.  If  we  take  in  hand  the  first  edition 
of  Hobson's  "  Fox-hunting  Atlas,"  we  can  now  hardly 
recognise  the  face  of  England,  so  many  are  the  new 
names  and  new  boundaries. 

The  Quorn  country  has  had  its  fair  share  of  changes, 
which  it  is  the  aim  of  this  chapter  to  point  out.  One 
hardly  knows  over  what  extent  of  country  Mr.  Boothby 
roamed,  but  his  limits  were  probably  wider  than  those 
of  Mr.  Meynell,  who  hunted  from  Clifton  Gardens,  near 
Nottingham,  to  Market  Harborouo;h,  even  if  he  did  eo 
a  little  wider.  He  had  at  his  command  what  are  now 
the  Quorn,  Mr.  Fernie's,  and  a  portion  of  the  Atherstone 
countries,  besides  other  slips  of  ground  which  have  since 
been  absorbed  into  other  hunts.  In  Mr.  Meynell's  time, 
however,  a  greater  extent  of  country  than  at  present  was 
needed.  There  were  not  nearly  so  many  foxes  in  the 
country  as  there  now  are,  and  Mr.  Meynell,  like  the 
Earls  of  Berkeley,  the  Dukes  of  Beaufort,  and  other 
masters,  was  probably  accustomed  to  visit  distant  parts 
of  his  territory  at  intervals,  for  the  number  of  square 
miles  which  now  suffice  for  two  days  a  week  would  not  in 


4  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

the  last  century  have  found  sport  for  one  day  in  a  fort- 
night or  three  weeks  ;  moreover,  vulpecide  was  possibly 
more  common  then  than  it  now  is.  In  reading  the 
accounts  of  the  different  runs,  however,  it  is  necessary  to 
remember  that  the  country  was  far  more  open  than  it  is 
at  present,  and  except  for  an  occasional  boundary  fence, 
hounds  mieht  run  for  miles  without  meeting  with  much 
to  stop  them. 

There  is  no  necessity  to  discuss  at  length  the  pre- 
cise boundaries  of  the  Ouorn  Hunt  in  the  days  of  Mr. 
Boothby  and  Mr.  Meynell  ;  it  will  suffice  to  say  that  the 
famous  hunt  in  question  was  shorn  of  some  of  its  country 
towards  the  latter  end  of  the  reign  of  Mr.  Assheton 
Smith  (1806-17),  when  in  or  about  the  year  18 14  Mr. 
Osbaldeston  brought  his  hounds  from  Nottinghamshire 
and  first  made  the  Atherstone  a  separate  hunt.  Portions 
of  the  country  had,  it  is  true,  been  hunted  by  other 
masters  ;  but  with  the  advent  of  the  Squire  the  Quorn 
country  was  deprived  of  part  of  its  ground.  There  was 
then  no  change,  at  least  no  material  change,  until  the 
year  1834,  when  Mr.  Holyoake  was  getting  near  to 
the  end  of  his  two  years'  mastership.  Then  it  was  that 
the  second  Marquis  of  Hastings,  a  right  good  sports- 
man, who  kept  a  smart  pack  of  harriers,  being  desirous 
of  having  more  hunting  nearer  home,  induced  Mr. 
Holyoake  to  cede  to  him  a  portion  of  his  country  on 
the  Donington  side,  and  building  kennels  at  his  resi- 
dence, appointed  Will  Head  as  his  huntsman,  his 
whippers  -  in  being  William  Markwell  and  Edward 
Evans. 

The  Donington  country,  as  it  was  called,  took  in 
some  of  the  forest,  and  stretched  away  into  Derbyshire, 
and,  as  the  Marquis  of  Hastings  announced  his  intention 
of  hunting  three  days  a  week,  there  was  every  chance 
of  those  who  lived  at  a  distance  from  the  centre  of  the 
Ouorn  country  enjoying  an  increased  amount  of  sport, 


THE    QUORN    COUNTRY  5 

for  there  were  then  seven  or  eight  days  with  hounds 
instead  of  four.  After  hunting  the  country  in  excellent 
style  for  about  seven  years,  the  Marquis  of  Hastings, 
who  loved  nothing  better  than  to  pass  his  time  at  home 
at  his  own  place  and  amongst  his  own  people,  relin- 
quished the  hounds  in  1842,  and  they  then  became  a 
subscription  pack.  The  marquis  lent  the  hounds  and 
kennels  ;  gave  ^500  a  year  to  the  hunt,  and  said  that 
he  would  give  more  if  necessary.  The  new  master  was 
Mr.  G.  B.  Story,  of  Lockington  Hall,  an  excellent 
sportsman,  and  a  first-rate  man  to  be  at  the  head  of  a 
hunt,  being  full  of  tact  and  energy. 

One  reason  why  the  Donington  hounds  were  so 
popular,  at  least  for  a  time,  was  that  neither  Mr.  Osbal- 
deston,  Lord  Southampton,  Sir  Harry  Goodricke,  nor 
Mr.  Holyoake  had  hunted  the  country  fairly.  The 
Melton  clique,  it  was  said,  used  their  utmost  endeavours 
to  induce  the  several  masters  to  confine  their  operations 
to  the  Melton  district.  The  result  was  that  on  the 
Donington  side  foxes  were  freely  destroyed,  and  as  one 
man  said,  "  Foxes  which  are  seldom  or  never  hunted  are 
a  luxury  which  no  one  can  afford  in  these  hard  times." 
The  Marquis  of  Hastings,  of  course,  knew  all  about  this 
state  of  things,  and  it  weighed  with  him  not  a  little  in 
his  desire  to  hunt  the  Donington  country  himself.  About 
a  couple  of  years  after  the  Marquis  of  Hastings  resigned 
the  country,  that  is  to  say,  in  January  1844,  he  died  ;  and 
for  a  short  period  after  his  death  the  country  continued 
to  be  hunted  with  something  like  the  vigour  which  had 
characterised  the  rule  of  the  late  master.  A  feeling  of 
respect  to  the  memory  of  the  Marquis  of  Hastings  doubt- 
less prompted  sundry  of  the  Donington  sportsmen  to 
continue  to  lend  a  helping  hand,  while  they  also  felt  that 
the  Quorn,  as  then  constituted,  was  not  strong  enough 
to  hunt  their  side  of  the  country  fairly.  Sir  H.  Blane, 
Mr.  Sutton  of  Shardlow  Hall,  and  Mr.  Story  did  all  that 


6  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

in  them  lay  to  promote  sport ;  but  by  degrees,  as  the 
hunt  had  lost  the  assistance  of  the  Marquis  of  Hastings, 
support  fell  off  in  other  quarters,  and  in  April  1851, 
about  midway  through  the  mastership  of  Sir  Richard 
Sutton,  the  Donington  country  was  handed  over  to  him, 
and  once  more  became  part  and  parcel  of  the  Quorn 
Hunt,  and  when  the  hounds  were  sold  by  Mr.  Breary  at 
the  kennels,  Sir  Richard  was  a  liberal  buyer,  his  purchase 
being  fifteen  couples  for  ^404,  5s.  Mr.  Villebois,  Sir 
Watkin  Wynn,  Mr.  Mure,  and  Mr.  Healey  Greaves  were 
the  other  buyers,  and  the  total  was  ,£669,  18s.  From 
this  period  Sir  Richard  Sutton  hunted  the  Donington 
side  himself,  and  so  did  some  succeeding  masters. 

There  was  no  further  division  of  the  country  until 
the  beginning  of  the  season  1876-77.  Mr.  Coupland 
had  then  been  six  years  in  office,  and  as  the  tenth 
Lord  Ferrers,  whose  seat  was  at  Staunton  Harold,  was 
anxious  to  hunt  the  old  Donington  country  two  days  a 
week,  a  slice  of  country  was  lent  to  him  by  the  Quorn. 
He  built  kennels  on  his  own  property,  and  filled  them 
with  the  hounds  with  which  Mr.  Standish  had  been  hunt- 
ing the  New  Forest  country.  Mr.  Standish  sold  them 
to  Mr.  Theodore  Mansel  Talbot,  who  first  of  all  kept 
harriers  ;  then  migrated  to  the  Ledbury  country  for  a 
short  spell,  returning  eventually  to  hunt  Glamorganshire, 
and  after  being  master  for  four  years  sold  his  hounds  to 
Lord  Ferrers,  replacing  them  with  a  pack  he  bought 
from  Mr.  J.  C.  Musters  ;  but  these  he  did  not  live  to 
hunt,  as  he  died  in  1876.  Though  for  various  reasons 
Lord  Ferrers's  country  did  not  appeal  to  the  Meltonians, 
it  was  good  sporting  country,  and  was  well  hunted  until 
1887,  when  the  Quorn  gave  notice  that  they  should 
require  it  back,  whereupon  about  ninety  hunting  and 
non-hunting  tenant-farmers,  together  with  several  land- 
owners, presented  a  petition  requesting  Lord  Ferrers  to 
continue  to  hunt  the  country.     With  that  request  he  was, 


THE    QUORN    COUNTRY  7 

of  course,  unable  to  comply,  and  what  had  aforetime 
been  the  Donington  country  once  more  reverted  to  the 
parent  pack,  and  is  still  (1898)  hunted  by  the  Quorn. 

Turn  we  now  to  the  Harborough  side.  This  was 
hunted  by  Sir  Richard  Sutton,  in  common  with  the  rest 
of  the  Quorn  country,  down  to  the  year  1S53,  when, 
finding  the  Quorn  country  too  big  for  him,  he  entrusted 
the  Billesdon,  or  South  Quorn,  side  to  his  son  Richard.1 
The  latter  was  not  able  to  show  very  grand  sport  during 
his  first  two  seasons,  his  exertions  being  thwarted  by 
excessive  drought.  At  the  beofinnino-  of  his  third  season 
Sir  Richard  died,  when  the  two  sons,  Richard  and 
Frank,  carried  on  the  two  countries  for  the  remainder 
of  the  season  until  Lord  Stamford  came  to  the  fore. 

Ben  Boothroyd,  who  had  hunted  the  Donington  under 
Sir  H.  Seymour  Blane  and  Mr.  Story,  went  as  kennel 
huntsman  and  first  whip  to  Mr.  Richard  Sutton,  and  on 
his  retirement  hunted  for  Lord  Stamford  for  one  season. 
This  brings  us  to  the  date  of  Lord  Stamford's  taking 
the  Quorn  Hunt  in  1856.      I  believe  that  the  actual  terms 

1  Mr.  Richard  Sutton,  the  second  son  of  Sir  Richard  Sutton,  had  a 
somewhat  varied  career.  Born  at  Sudbrooke  Hall  in  Lincolnshire  on  the 
21st  October  1821,  he  entered  the  navy  as  a  first-class  volunteer  on  board 
H.M.S.  Pique,  commanded  by  the  Hon.  Captain  (afterwards  Admiral) 
Rous,  of  turf  fame.  Mr.  Sutton  was  on  the  Pique  during  her  memorable 
voyage  from  Quebec,  when,  after  getting  ashore  and  bumping  on  the  rocks 
for  about  ten  hours,  with  the  loss  of  nearly  all  her  guns,  Captain  Rous 
brought  her  home  very  much  disabled.  From  the  Pique  Mr.  Sutton  went 
to  the  President,  on  the  South  American  station,  with  Captain  Scott,  where 
he  remained  for  two  years  and  a  half.  Then  casting  aside  his  blue  coat 
he  donned  a  red  one,  joining  the  1st  Life  Guards,  in  which  regiment  he 
remained  but  a  short  time.  Meantime  his  sporting  proclivities  had  always 
been  strong.  When  no  more  than  six  years  old  he  was  put  on  a  pony 
which  his  father  had  bought  from  old  Mason,  the  dealer,  of  Stilton.  Sir 
Richard  then  living  at  Lundford  Hall,  close  to  Buckenham,  the  residence 
of  General  Peel,  the  younger  branches  of  the  two  families  were  wont  to 
amuse  themselves  by  having  impromptu  races  on  their  ponies,  and  on  one 
occasion  young  Dick  Sutton,  after  he  had  been  beaten  for  speed  on  the  flat 
by  a  young  Peel,  jumped  a  gate  three  times  and  challenged  his  conqueror 
to  follow  him.  Then,  as  already  mentioned,  he  was  entrusted  by  his  father 
with  the  Harborough  side. 


8  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

of  Lord  Stamford's  offer  were  to  hunt  without  a  sub- 
scription the  same  amount  of  country  that  Sir  Richard 
Sutton  had  hunted  over,  and  as  the  new  master  dis- 
pensed with  a  subscription,  it  was  considered  expedient 
to  allow  him  to  have  his  way  in  this  respect. 

This  was  eventually  the  fons  et  origo  of  a  dispute 
which  raged  long  and  hotly  in  the  Ouorn  and  Billesdon 
countries.  On  one  side  it  was  said  that  Lord  Stamford 
had  abandoned  the  Billesdon  country  ;  on  the  other  it 
was  urged  that  the  country  was  lent  only,  just  as  part 
of  the  Cottesmore  with  some  woodlands  were  loaned. 
A  short  time  after  Lord  Stamford's  succession  to  office 
Mr.  W.  W.  Tailby,  amid  great  acclamation,  became 
master  of  the  Billesdon,  or  South  Ouorn,  country,  for- 
merly hunted  by  Mr.  Sutton,  and,  with  Jack  Goddard 
for  his  huntsman,  began  a  brilliant  era  of  sport.  At  this 
lapse  of  time  there  is  no  need  to  follow  the  dispute 
which  ultimately  took  place.  Suffice  it  to  say  that  in 
due  time  the  Cottesmore,  then  in  the  hands  of  Colonel 
Lowther,  afterwards  Lord  Lonsdale,  gave  notice  that 
they  would  require  back  the  country  they  had  lent,  and 
Mr.  Coupland  at  the  same  time  intimated  that  he  would 
like  back  the  Quorn  portion,  though  this  request  was 
not  made  until  Mr.  Tailby  had  announced  his  intention 
of  resigning.  Then  it  was  that  a  somewhat  bitter  dis- 
pute arose.  Meetings  were  held,  various  opinions  were 
expressed,  and  a  great  deal  of  angry  correspondence 
took  place.  To  cut  a  long  and  not  very  interesting 
story  short,  the  matter  was  referred  to  the  Masters  of 
Foxhounds'  Committee  at  Boodle's,  that  body  deciding 
in  favour  of  the  Quorn  bein^  entitled  to  reclaim  the 
country  which  Lord  Stamford  did  not  want  to  hunt,  and 
which  he  allowed  Mr.  Tailby  to  have.  That  decision, 
however,  did  not  please  every  one.  Farmers  were  asked 
in  a  letter  to  stand  out  for  their  rights  ;  "  Who's  Boodle  ? 
Where  does  he  live  ?  " 


THE    QUORN    COUNTRY  9 

The  point  gained,  however,  further  opposition  on 
the  part  of  the  Ouorn  authority  was  withdrawn.  Mr. 
Tailby  consented  to  hunt  a  limited  area  two  days  a 
week;  resigning  in  1880  to  Sir  Bache  Cunard,  who  was 
succeeded  in  1888  by  Mr.  Fernie,  and  in  this  manner 
is  Leicestershire  now  mapped  out. 


io  THE    QUORN    HUNT 


MELTON     MOWBRAY 

MELTON,  a  country  town  which  is  to  all  intents 
and  purposes  kept  alive  by  fox-hunting,  is  a  very 
different  place  from  what  it  once  was,  in  fact  in  Mr. 
Meynell's  earlier  days  it  had  practically  no  existence. 
Leicester  and  Loughborough  were  the  places  towards 
which  Mr.  Meynell's  followers  gravitated,  and  it  was  at 
Loughborough  that  the  Ouorndon  Club  was  established, 
long  before  the  Old  Club  at  Melton  was  ever  dreamed  of. 
Mr.  Ralph  Lambton,  afterwards  master  of  the  famous 
Lambton  Hounds  (subsequently  bought  by  Lord  Suffield), 
after  leaving  Cambridge  "without  a  shilling  of  debt," 
made  the  Grand  Tour,  and  in  1787  succeeded  his  father 
as  member  for  Durham  ;  and  it  was  in  the  same  year  that 
he  enrolled  himself  as  one  of  Mr.  Meynell's  followers, 
making  the  Ouorndon  Club  his  headquarters.  Those, 
however,  were  the  days  of  somewhat  boisterous  merri- 
ment, and  Mr.  Lambton,  who  was  a  quiet  and  somewhat 
shy  man,  finding  his  companions  rather  too  high-spirited 
for  him,  cast  about  for  a  quieter  location  and  eventually 
selected  "the  unfrequented  town  of  Melton,"  and  he  is 
said  to  have  been  the  first  man  to  take  a  house  there. 
Nowadays  it  seems  strange  that  a  Leicestershire  fox- 
hunter  should  have  gone  to  Melton  to  find  solitude ! 
Mr.  Lambton,  however,  lived  in  what  has  been  described 
as  a  style  of  great  magnificence.  He  had  a  fine  stud, 
and  was  most  hospitable. 

It  was  not  long  before  other  famous  sportsmen  fol- 
lowed Mr.  Ralph   Lambton's  example.      Lords  Forester 


MELTON    MOWBRAY  n 

and  Delamere  (then  Messrs.  Forester  and  Cholmondeley) 
and  two  or  three  others  had  for  some  time  lived  at 
Loughborough  to  hunt  with  Mr.  Meynell  ;  they  eventu- 
ally removed  to  Melton,  took  a  house,  where  they  were 
joined  by  Mr.  Smythe  Owen  of  Condover  Hall,  Shrop- 
shire, and  that  dwelling  eventually  became  the  Old  Club, 
the  members  of  which  were  restricted  to  four,  that  being 
the  number  of  the  best  bedrooms.  Soon  after  the  estab- 
lishment of  the  Old  Club,  putting  up  horses  for  auction 
was  a  common  proceeding  after  dinner.  "  Parties,"  writes 
"  The  Druid,"  in  Scott  and  Sebright,  "were  often  made  on 
purpose,  and  after  a  couple  of  bottles  of  claret,  business 
became  quite  brisk.  Each  owner  had  one  reserve  bid, 
and  it  was  quite  a  sight  the  next  morning  to  watch  the 
different  horses  change  stables,  to  the  great  bewilderment 
of  the  grooms.  Several  were  very  sweet  on  the  Widow 
(the  property  of  Captain  White)  the  first  day  she  came 
out,  and  ^400  was  put  under  the  candlestick.  The 
captain's  reserve  bid  was  ^100  above  that  sum,  and 
after  the  Billesdon  Coplow  day,  Lord  Middleton  did 
not  scruple  to  close  further  ! !  This  'putting  up  '  practice, 
however,  soon  died  out."  Later  on,  while  still  the  club, 
this  became  the  home  of  the  four  M's — Sir  James  Mus- 
grave  and  Messrs.  Maher,  Maxse,  and  Moore — who  were 
included  in  these  lines  : — 

First  the  Old  Club  Men,  a  compact  of  four 
Sporting  old  Ladies,  led  on  by  John  Moore ; 
Val  Maher  on  Potash  and  Musgrave  behind, 
On  his  Titus,  so  testy,  comes  panting  for  wind. 
But  hark  forward  !  one  hero  is  here  to  be  found — 
The  merry  Jem  Maxse  ;  and  show  me  the  pack 
That  he  cannot  ride  up  to  on  old  Cognac. 

Subsequently  two  younger  clubs  came  into  exist- 
ence. Lord  Alvanley's  old  house,  opposite  the  George, 
became  the  New  Club,  and  Sir  Harry  Goodricke's  Lord 
Rokeby's    Club.       Within    comparatively    recent    years 


12  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

there  was  some  talk  about  establishing  a  club  on  a  larger 
scale,  to  accommodate  those  who  did  not  care  about  the 
expense  involved  in  hotels  or  a  private  establishment  ; 
but  so  far  as  is  known  the  project  came  to  nothing. 

Lord  Alvanley,  mentioned  just  now,  was  quite  one  of 
the  foremost  of  the  Meltonians  for  a  good  many  years, 
roughly  speaking,  from  1808  or  thereabouts  till  well  into 
the  thirties.  He  was  rather  a  character  in  his  way,  and 
wore,  says  Mr.  Birch  Reynardson,  "the  most  monstrous 
pair  of  boots  that  perhaps  ever  were  seen  on  any  man's 
legs.  At  one  time  he  wore  ordinary  top-boots  ;  but  one 
day  he  appeared  at  the  covert  side  in  a  pair  of  boots  the 
upper  extremities  of  which  were  like  those  worn  by  the 
Household  cavalry,  though  the  tops  began  in  the  usual 
place.  A  former  Duke  of  Rutland  injured  one  of  his 
knees  by  a  thorn  piercing  it,  so  he  had  one  boot  made 
in  order  to  protect  the  injured  limb.  Lord  Alvanley 
took  the  hint,  and  caused  several  pairs  to  be  made  to 
the  pattern,  as  bullfinches  were  then  common  enough  in 
Leicestershire.  In  some  ways  these  boots  were  a  grand 
invention  ;  but  they  had  their  drawbacks,  as  being  open 
above  the  knee,  dead  wood  and  thorns  would  occasion- 
ally fall  into  them,  work  down  to  the  calves,  and  then 
tickle  his  lordship  no  end."  Lord  Alvanley  was  one  of 
the  jokers  of  the  hunt,  but  some  of  his  jests  do  not 
appear  always  to  have  been  in  the  best  of  taste.  On 
one  occasion  he  encountered  at  Brighton  Lord  Foley — 
not  the  Lord  Foley  who  was  master  of  the  Quorn 
hounds,  but  a  later  holder  of  the  title.  Lord  Foley  was 
rather  deformed  and  so  went  into  society  comparatively 
little,  devoting  himself,  after  he  gave  up  racing,  to  his 
carriage-horses.  Said  Lord  Alvanley  to  Lord  Foley, 
"Hullo,   how   did   you   get   here?"      "I    came   straight 

from   London,"   was   the   reply.      "  D it,   then,   you 

have  warped  a  good  deal  on  the  way  down,"  was  Lord 
Alvanley's  not  very  courteous  retort. 


MELTON    MOWBRAY  13 

Concerning  the  progress  of  Melton,  "  Nimrod,"  in  an 
article  contributed  to  Frascr  s  Magazine,  wrote  :  — 

When  I  first  visited  Melton  there  was  only  one  inn,  and  that 
a  very  bad  one ;  not  one  bank,  and  but  few  houses  with  which  a 
well-breeched  Meltonian  would  be  satisfied.  But  what  a  change 
has  taken  place  in  these  respects.  There  is  nothing  now  wanting 
at  Melton  for  any  man's  comforts,  provided  he  has  the  means  to 
pay  for  them  ;  and  there  are  two  hotels,  the  George  and  the  Har- 
borough  Arms,  which  equal  in  accommodation  and  comfort  any 
that  I  have  experience  of.  Some  idea  indeed  may  be  formed  of 
the  style  in  which  the  Harborough  is  fitted  up,  by  the  fact  that 
the  very  passages,  upstairs  and  down,  were  entirely  covered  with 
carpet. 

What  would  "  Nimrod  "  have  said  to  the  Grands 
and  Metropoles  of  our  own  time  ? 

When  people  began  to  flock  to  Melton,  where  houses 
were  being  built  by  degrees,  they  naturally  brought  a 
good  deal  of  money  into  the  place  ;  but  this  advantage 
was  to  a  great  extent  counterbalanced  by  the  rowdyism 
which  went  on,  and  the  low  practical  jokes  in  which  the 
visitors  thought  fit  to  indulge.  Needless  to  say  there 
was  then  no  ladies'  society  in  Melton,  for  men  never 
dreamed  of  taking  their  women-folk  there.  Families 
resided  in  the  neighbourhood,  of  course,  and  they  hospi- 
tably invited  to  their  table  those  visitors  who  were  living 
en  garfon  ;  but  the  visitors  left  the  wives  at  home.  Some 
of  Lord  Waterford's  exploits  are  mentioned  in  connec- 
tion with  Lord  Stamford's  mastership,  but  there  were 
plenty  of  others  ready  to  join  him  in  any  mad  frolic  in 
which  he  might  indulge,  while  there  were  some  who 
backed  their  collection  of  door-knockers,  London  and 
provincial,  against  that  of  even  Lord  Waterford.  In  the 
days  of  which  one  is  speaking  everything  gave  way  to 
hunting.  Long  rides  to  covert  and  home  again  were 
the  rule,  and  the  hunting  man  of  the  period  had  little 
more  time  than  to  dress  for  dinner,  dine,  make  his  plans 


i4  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

for  the  morrow,  take  forty  winks  and  be  off  to  bed, 
rising  early  in  the  morning  in  order  to  be  present  at 
some  distant  fixture. 

The  Melton  men  always  boasted  that  they  set  the 
fashion  to  the  hunting  world,  and  that  when  they  increased 
or  decreased  the  depth  of  the  coat  collar,  the  length  or 
width  of  the  skirts,  or  discarded  tight  breeches  for  looser 
garments,  the  provincials  followed  suit.  Among  other 
things,  they  claimed  to  have  introduced  the  custom  of 
dining  in  scarlet  coats.1  It  is,  we  know,  the  case  that 
in  the  Squire  Western  days  men  sat  down  to  dinner  in 
the  red  coats  which  they  had  worn  during  the  morning  ; 
but  the  red  dress-coat  may  be  distinctly  traced  to  Melton, 
and  it  is  on  record  that  an  eccentric  Scottish  laird,  Jamie 
Johnstone,  who  hunted  from  Melton  in  the  long  ago, 
startled  his  friends  by  appearing  at  dinner,  not  only  in  a 
red  coat,  but  in  a  pair  of  scarlet  leggings  as  well,  which 

1  How  or  why  the  scarlet  coat  first  came  to  be  used  for  hunting  I  have 
never  been  able  to  ascertain.  Many  years  ago  there  was  an  article  in  one 
of  the  London  magazines  about  red  coats,  and  it  was  therein  stated  that 
Henry  II.  or  III.,  I  forget  which,  was  so  pleased  with  a  fox-hunt  that  he 
ordained  it  should  be  a  royal  sport  and  that  red  should  be  the  colour  of  the 
coat.  This  was  obvious  nonsense,  because  it  is  by  no  means  clear  that  red 
had,  at  that  time,  anything  to  do  with  the  royal  livery.  Among  the  ques- 
tions propounded  by  Tit  Bits  at  a  later  year  was  one  asking  why  scarlet 
came  to  be  the  recognised  colour  of  the  hunting-coat,  and  the  answer  in  a 
following  number  was  the  same  as  that  given  above,  viz ,  that  it  was  due  to 
the  order  of  one  of  the  Henrys.  I  therefore  wrote  to  the  editor  asking  for 
further  information  ;  but  none  was  forthcoming,  the  correspondent  who 
answered  the  question  having  apparently  been  content  to  copy  out  what 
had  been  inserted  in  the  magazine  or  what  appeared  in  "  The  Noble  Science" 
by  Mr.  Delme  Radcliffe.  At  page  144  (fourth  edition,  Nimmo,  1893)  tne 
author  says  :  "The  custom  of  wearing  scarlet  in  fox-hunting  is  supposed  to 
have  had  its  origin  in  the  circumstance  of  its  being  a  royal  sport,  confirmed 
by  the  mandate  of  one  King  Henry,  who  organised  and  equipped,  in  the 
royal  livery  of  scarlet,  a  corps  for  the  destruction  of  foxes,  not  after  the 
manner  which  we  should  recognise  as  legitimate  in  the  present  day.  This 
is  at  least  a  plausible  and,  at  all  events,  right  royal  way  of  accounting  for  a 
habit  rather  of  martial  than  sylvan  import,  were  it  not  otherwise  sufficiently 
recommended  by  the  cheerfulness  which  it  imparts  to  the  aspect  of  the 
field."  Then  I  wrote  to  the  editor  of  Notes  and  Queries,  who  courteously 
inserted  my  question  as  to  the  origin  of  the  scarlet  coat  for  hunting,  but  no 
reply  was  ever  made, 


MELTON    MOWBRAY  15 

caused  one  of  his  friends  to  remark  that  he  supposed 
Jamie  wore  red  gaiters  so  that  he  should  not  be  taken 
for  a  blackleg. 

In  due  course,  however,  the  spoliation  of  sign-boards, 
the  tarring  and  feathering,  the  street  brawls,  all  of  which 
were,  rightly  or  wrongly,  laid  to  the  account  of  the 
hunting  visitors,  gave  way  to  a  better  state  of  things, 
and  some  time  prior  to  1850  Melton  had  become  quite 
an  exemplary  place.  Literary  societies  came  into  fashion, 
we  are  told  ;  ladies  came  to  Melton,1  and  everything  took 
an  upward  turn.  Much  of  the  credit  for  this  state  of 
things  is  said  to  have  been  due  to  the  Lord  Wilton  of  the 
time  ;  he  who  rode  well  up  to  the  time  of  his  death,  when 
aged  about  eighty.  Egerton  Lodge  had  been  bought 
from  Lord  Darlington,  and  after  being  altered  and 
enlarged,  became  one  of  the  finest  hunting  residences 
in  the  county,  and  there  the  juvenile  members  were 
accustomed  to  indulge  in  private  theatricals,  and  give 
other  entertainments. 

Melton,  like  other  places,  has  moved  with  the 
times,  and  now  every  decorum  reigns  supreme,  and 
the  social  life  of  this  delightful  and  famous  hunting 
centre  is  very  much  like  what  it  is  in  other  places, 
all  residents  and  visitors  appearing  to  enjoy  them- 
selves. 

One  little  matter  there  was,  however,  which  rather 
upset  the  proprieties  of  Melton  in  1890 — the  "midnight 
steeplechase."  A  mild  affair  was  got  up,  but  as  the 
moon  did  not  serve  till  about  midnight,  the  start  could 
not  take  place  till  then ;  the  jockeys,  following  the 
example  of  those  who  are  supposed  to  have  taken  part 
in  the  mythical  "  first  steeplechase  on  record,"  wore 
white  garments  ;  the  course  was  lit  by  lamps,  and 
Melton  was  possibly  rather  lively  at  a  later  hour  than 

1  The  Duchess  of  Devonshire  and  numerous  other  ladies  hunted  with  the 
Quorn  in  the  time  of  Mr.  Meynell. 


16  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

usual.  A  detailed  description  of  the  event  is  unnecessary, 
but  the  affair  gave  rise,  on  the  following  Sunday,  to  what 
are  known  as  "pulpit  utterances,"  the  steeplechase  being 
denounced  in  more  than  one  place  of  worship  in  the 
town.  The  vicar  took  for  his  text,  "  Have  no  fellowship 
with  the  unfruitful  works  of  darkness,  but  rather  reprove 
them,"  and  at  the  conclusion  of  his  discourse  he  reminded 
his  hearers  that  the  Melton  of  1890  was  not  the  Melton 
of  1837,  and  that  the  town,  while  welcoming  its  visitors, 
did  not  want  the  scenes  which  had  been  common  fifty- 
three  years  previously  to  be  re-enacted.  Enough,  how- 
ever, of  the  midnight  steeplechase,  which,  after  all,  was 
not  hunting. 

Pour  passer  le  temps  on  Sunday  afternoons  it  had  no 
doubt  been  the  custom  for  some  time  for  men  to  look 
over  their  friends'  studs,  but  in  the  forties,  if  not 
before,  "doing  stables"  on  Sunday  afternoon  appears 
to  have  attained  the  dignity  of  a  recognised  function. 
Stables  were  made  to  look  as  trim  as  complicated  plait- 
ing and  pipe-claying  could  cause  them  to  look,  and 
horses,  like  so  many  men,  had  Sunday  coats,  that  is  to 
say,  they  had  special  suits  to  be  worn  during  visiting 
hours  while  critics,  skilled  and  unskilled,  were  passing 
remarks  upon  the  merits  of  the  horses  in  the  different 
studs.  The  wealthy  Mr.  Lyne  Stephens  clothed  his 
horses  (on  Sunday)  in  green  sheets  magnificently 
embroidered  with  gold  ;  but  after  a  while  this  sort  of 
thing  struck  most  of  the  Meltonians  as  exceedingly 
absurd,  and  so  the  Sunday  coat  was  given  up  almost 
before  it  was  half  worn  out.  As  mentioned  elsewhere, 
the  stables  of  Mr.  Lyne  Stephens,  like  those  of  many 
other  Meltonians,  were  fitted  up  in  the  very  best  style, 
though  perhaps  no  Meltonian  ever  reached  the  standard 
attained  by  an  eccentric  Hertfordshire  sportsman,  who 
carried  stable  fittings  up  to  the  point  of  absurdity.  The 
stall  partitions  were  made  of  mahogany,  and  an  elegant 


MELTON    MOWBRAY  17 

lamp  was  suspended  over  each  stall  ;  a  round  table  was 
wheeled  in  after  dinner,  and  to  the  stable  the  host,  and 
any  one  he  might  have  dining  with  him,  used  to  retreat 
after  dinner,  and  while  sipping  their  wine  would  see  the 
horses  bedded  up  for  the  night. 

Every  stranger  who  went  on  a  visit  to  Melton  was 
accustomed  to  come  away  full  of  admiration  at  the  condi- 
tion and  appearance  of  the  horses  he  saw,  though  this 
was  possibly  nothing  more  than  a  natural  sequence  of 
the  surroundings.  In  the  first  place,  the  horses  were  of 
the  best  ;  the  grooms  were  supposed  to  be  of  the  true 
Mr.  Tip-top  type  ;  and  the  studs  being  large,  no  horse 
was  overworked.  Lord  Plymouth  had  once  six-and- 
twenty  horses  in  his  stable,  and  he  bought  another  at 
500  guineas  in  case  he  might  want  it  later  on  ;  while 
from  a  dozen  to  twenty  was  no  uncommon  number  ;  but 
most  of  the  Melton  men  of  that  day  are  said  to  have 
been  ready  to  buy  a  likely  horse  whether  they  wanted 
one  or  not.  Prom  all  accounts  there  was  great  rivalry 
among  the  helpers  and  stud-grooms  as  to  the  appearance 
of  the  horses,  which  must  have  been  at  any  rate  a  good 
thing  for  the  owners,  as  it  necessarily  saved  them  much 
fault-finding.  The  stud-groom  of  the  period,  however, 
was  a  bit  of  a  tyrant.  Sir  James  Musgrave  had  a 
very  good,  if  somewhat  jealous,  head  man,  and  it  was 
Sir  James's  custom  to  have  his  horses  summered  at  his 
country  house,  where  he  kept  them  until  the  eve  of  the 
hunting  season,  when  they  were  sent  to  the  Melton 
stables.  A  few  weeks  before  they  were  sent  to  Leices- 
tershire the  stud-groom,  who  had  up  to  that  time  been 
feeding  the  horses  on  oats,  told  Sir  James  that  the  time 
had  arrived  when  he  must  give  them  some  beans  as  well. 
For  some  reason  or  other,  Sir  James  Musgrave  objected, 
whereupon  the  stud-groom  told  the  baronet  that  he  (the 
groom)  must  either  buy  beans  out  of  his  own  pocket  or 
else  "decline  his  service."     The  groom  carried  his  point, 

13 


18  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

and  Sir  James  Musgrave's  horses  came  out  in  their 
usual  excellent  condition. 

Every  one  who  knows  anything  about  hunting  has 
heard  of  the  larking  home  to  Melton  after  a  poor  day, 
and  Dick  Christian  has  left  it  on  record  that  he  was 
often  "the  fox."  On  one  occasion,  after  the  hounds  had 
met  at  Melton,  a  long  tiring  day  ensued.  Two  foxes 
were  certainly  killed  ;  but  they  showed  no  sport.  When 
the  hounds  were  ordered  home  (this  was  in  Sir  Harry 
Goodricke's  time),  half-a-dozen  men  started  to  find  their 
way  home  to  Melton.  Lord  Gardner  took  the  lead,  and 
at  one  place  came  down  a  cropper,  and  lost  his  horse  ;  but 
instead  of  rushing  off  on  foot  and  crying,  "  Catch  my 
horse!  pray  catch  my  horse!"  which  Assheton  Smith  said 
was  such  low  form,  he  simply  waited  for  the  next  man, 
who  chanced  to  be  Lord  Wilton.  As  soon  as  the  latter 
had  cleared  the  fence  he  pulled  up,  Lord  Gardner  jumped 
up  behind  him,  and  the  pair  went  sailing  away  after  the 
loose  horse,  which  some  one  eventually  caught.  Lord 
Gardner  then  mounted  his  own  hunter,  and  carried  on 
the  larking  to  Melton. 

This  chapter  may  perhaps  be  fitly  closed  with  a 
reproduction  of  the  late  Mr.  Bromley  Davenport's 
spirited  verses. 


THE  DREAM  OF  AN  OLD  MELTONIAN 


I  am  old,  I  am  old,  and  my  eyes  are  grown  weaker, 

My  beard  is  as  white  as  the  foam  on  the  sea, 
Yet  pass  me  the  bottle,  and  fill  me  a  beaker, 

A  bright  brimming  toast  in  a  bumper  for  me  ! 
Back,  back  through  long  vistas  of  years  I  am  wafted, 

But  the  glow  at  my  heart's  undiminished  in  force, 
Deep,  deep  in  that  heart  has  fond  memory  engrafted 

Those  quick  thirty  minutes  from  Ranksboro'  Gorse. 


MELTON    MOWBRAY  19 


What  is  time  ?  the  effluxion  of  life  zoophitic 

In  dreary  pursuit  of  position  or  gain. 
What  is  life?  the  absorption  of  vapours  mephitic, 

And  the  bursting  of  sunlight  on  senses  and  brain  ! 
Such  a  life  have  I  lived — though  so  speedily  over, 

Condensing  the  joys  of  a  century's  course, 
From  the  find  till  we  eat  him  near  Woodwellhead  Cover, 

In  thirty  bright  minutes  from  Ranksboro'  Gorse. 


in 

Last  night  in  St.  Stephen's  so  wearily  sitting, 

(The  member  for  Boreham  sustained  the  debate), 
Some  pitying  spirit  that  round  me  was  flitting 

Vouchsafed  a  sweet  vision  my  pains  to  abate. 
The  Mace,  and  the  Speaker,  and  House  disappearing, 

The  leather-clad  bench  is  a  thoroughbred  horse ; 
'Tis  the  whimpering  cry  of  the  foxhound  I'm  hearing, 

And  my  "  seat "  is  a  pig-skin  at  Ranksboro'  Gorse. 


He's  away  !  I  can  hear  the  identical  holloa  ! 

I  can  feel  my  young  thoroughbred  strain  down  the  ride, 
I  can  hear  the  dull  thunder  of  hundreds  that  follow, 

I  can  see  my  old  comrades  in  life  by  my  side. 
Do  I  dream  ?  all  around  me  I  see  the  dead  riding, 

And  voices  long  silent  re-echo  with  glee ; 
I  can  hear  the  far  wail  of  the  Master's  vain  chiding, 

As  vain  as  the  Norseman's  reproof  to  the  sea. 


Vain  indeed  !  for  the  bitches  are  racing  before  us — 

Not  a  nose  to  the  earth — not  a  stern  in  the  air ; 
And  we  know  by  the  notes  of  that  modified  chorus 

How  straight  we  must  ride  if  we  wish  to  be  there ! 
With  a  crash  o'er  the  turnpike,  and  onward  I'm  sailing, 

Released  from  the  throes  of  the  blundering  mass, 
Which  dispersed  right  and  left  as  I  topped  the  high  railing 

And  shape  my  own  course  o'er  the  billowy  grass. 


2o  THE    QUORN    HUNT 


VI 

Select  is  the  circle  in  which  I  am  moving, 

Yet  open  and  free  the  admission  to  all ; 
Still,  still  more  select  is  that  company  proving, 

Weeded  out  by  the  funker  and  thinned  by  the  fall 
Yet  here  all  are  equals — no  class  legislation, 

No  privilege  hinders,  no  family  pride : 
In  the  "image  of  war"  show  the  pluck  of  the  nation 

Ride,  ancient  patrician  !  democracy,  ride  ! 


VII 

Oh  !  gently,  my  young  one ;  the  fence  we  are  nearing 

Is  leaning  towards  us — 'tis  hairy  and  black, 
The  binders  are  strong,  and  necessitate  clearing, 

Or  the  wide  ditch  beyond  will  find  room  for  your  back. 
Well  saved  !  we  are  over  !  now  far  down  the  pastures 

Of  Ashwell  the  willows  betoken  the  line 
Of  the  dull-flowing  stream  of  historic  disasters  ; 

We  must  face,  my  bold  young  one,  the  dread  Whissendine  ! 


VIII 

No  shallow-dug  pan  with  a  hurdle  to  screen  it, 

That  cock- tail  imposture  the  steeplechase  brook  ; 
But  the  steep  broken  banks  tell  us  plain,  if  we  mean  it, 

The  less  we  shall  like  it  the  longer  we  look. 
Then  steady,  my  young  one,  my  place  I've  selected, 

Above  the  dwarf  willow  'tis  sound  I'll  be  bail, 
With  your  muscular  quarters  beneath  you  collected, 

Prepare  for  a  rush  like  the  "limited  mail." 


Oh  !  now  let  me  know  the  full  worth  of  your  breeding, 

Brave  son  of  Belzoni,  be  true  to  your  sires, 
Sustain  old  traditions — remember  you're  leading 

The  cream  of  the  cream  in  the  shire  of  the  shires  ! 
With  a  quick  shortened  stride  as  the  distance  you  measure, 

With  a  crack  of  the  nostril  and  cock  of  the  ear, 
And  a  rocketing  bound,  and  we're  over,  my  treasure, 

Twice  nine  feet  of  water,  and  landed  all  clear  ! 


MELTON    MOWBRAY  21 


What !  four  of  us  only  ?  are  these  the  survivors 

Of  all  that  rode  gaily  from  Ranksboro's  ridge  ? 
I  hear  the  faint  splash  of  a  few  hardy  divers, 

The  rest  are  in  hopeless  research  of  a  bridge ; 
Vce  virtis!  the  way  of  the  world  and  the  winners  ! 

Do  we  ne'er  ride  away  from  a  friend  in  distress  ? 
Alas  !  we  are  anti-Samaritan  sinners, 

And  streaming  past  Stapleford,  onward  we  press. 


XI 

Ah  !  don't  they  mean  mischief,  the  merciless  ladies  ? 

What  fox  can  escape  such  implacable  foes  ? 
Of  the  sex  cruel  slaughter  for  ever  the  trade  is, 

Whether  human  or  animal — Yonder  he  goes  ! 
Never  more  for  the  woodland  !  his  purpose  has  failed  him, 

Though  to  gain  the  old  shelter  he  gallantly  tries  ; 
In  vain  the  last  double,  for  Jezebel's  nailed  him  ; 

Whoo-Whoop  !  in  the  open  the  veteran  dies  ! 


XII 

Yes,  four  of  us  only  !  but  is  it  a  vision  ? 

Dear  lost  ones,  how  come  ye  with  mortals  to  mix  ? 
Methought  that  ye  hunted  the  pastures  Elysian, 

And  between  us  there  rolled  the  unjumpable  Styx  ! 
Stay,  stay  but  a  moment !  the  grass  fields  are  fading, 

And  heavy  obscurity  palsies  my  brain  ; 
Through  what  country,  what  ploughs  and  what  sloughs  am  I 
wading  ? 

Alas  !  'tis  the  member  for  Boreham  aerain  ! 


XIII 

Oh  glory  of  youth  !  consolation  of  age  ! 

Sublimest  of  ecstasies  under  the  sun  ! 
Though  the  veteran  may  linger  too  long  on  the  stage, 

Yet  he'll  drink  a  last  toast  to  a  fox-hunting  run. 
And  oh  !  young  descendants  of  ancient  top-sawyers  ! 

By  your  lives  to  the  world  their  example  enforce ; 
Whether  landlords,  or  parsons,  or  statesmen,  or  lawyers, 

Ride  straight,  as  they  rode  it  from  Ranksboro'  Gorse. 


22 


THE    QUORN    HUNT 


Though  a  rough-riding  world  may  bespatter  your  breeches, 

Though  sorrow  may  cross  you,  or  slander  revile, 
Though  you  plunge  overhead  in  misfortune's  blind  ditches, 

Shun  the  gap  of  deception,  the  hand-gate  of  guile  : 
Oh,  avoid  them  !  for  there,  see  the  crowd  is  contending, 

Ignoble  the  object — ill-mannered  the  throng ; 
Shun  the  miry  lane,  falsehood,  with  turns  never  ending, 

Ride  straight  for  truth's  timber,  no  matter  how  strong. 

xv 

I'll  pound  you  safe  over !  sit  steady  and  quiet ; 

Along  the  sound  headland  of  honesty  steer  ; 
Beware  of  false  holloas  and  juvenile  riot, 

Though  the  oxer  of  duty  be  wide,  never  fear  ! 
And  when  the  run's  over  of  earthly  existence, 

And  you  get  safe  to  ground,  you  will  feel  no  remorse, 
If  you  ride  it — no  matter  what  line  or  what  distance — 

As  straight  as  your  fathers  from  Ranksboro'  Gorse. 


THE    QUORN    KENNELS  23 


THE    QUORN    KENNELS 

IT  is  something  like  a  hundred  and  fifty  years  since 
Mr.  Meynell  began  to  hunt  the  famed  Ouorn 
country,  and  now  after  so  many  years,  after  the  rule  of 
so  many  masters,  and  so  many  fresh  sites,  the  Quorn 
kennels  are  just  in  the  place  which  Mr.  Meynell  selected 
as  soon  as  he  had  fairly  settled  into  harness.  When  he 
lived  at  Langton  Hall  with  "Prince"  Boothby,  quite 
early  in  his  career,  Mr.  Meynell  kept  his  hounds  at 
Bowden  Inn,  on  the  Pytchley  side  of  his  country. 
Ouorndon  Hall  he  afterwards  bought  from  Lord  Ferrers, 
about  the  year  1754,  and  the  kennels  there  are,  as 
subsequent  events  have  shown,  the  best  that  could  be 
chosen.  Mr.  Meynell  doubtless  had  his  eye  on  Charn- 
wood  Forest,  then  far  more  open  than  it  is  now,  as  a 
fine  schooling-ground  for  hounds,  and  a  grand  area  for 
spring  and  autumn  hunting.  It  must  be  remembered  that 
Mr.  Meynell's  country  reached  from  near  Nottingham  to 
Market  Harborough,  and  embraced  a  good  deal  of  the 
present  Atherstone  Hunt.  It  is  clear,  therefore,  that  from 
no  one  base  could  all  the  fixtures  have  been  reached. 

The  Bowden  Inn  kennels  having  once  been  found 
convenient,  were  kept  on  for  occasional  use  after  Ouorn- 
don Hall  became  the  headquarters  of  the  pack.  In  the 
time  of  the  "  Primate  of  the  Science,"  too,  other  kennels 
are  mentioned.  The  hounds  sometimes  went  to  Brad- 
gate  Park  ;  but  that  was  then  Lord  Stamford's  place,  so 
when  Mr.  Meynell  quartered  on  him,  it  was  most  pro- 
bably as  a  guest  for  some  particular  fixture.  Bradley, 
too,  is  mentioned  in  connection  with  the  Ravensdale  side 


24  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

of  the  country,  and  from  all  these  and,  at  times,  other 
places  being  visited  by  the  hounds,  has  no  doubt  been 
suggested  the  idea  that  it  was  one  of  Mr.  Meynell's 
fancies  that  his  hounds  should  never  have  more  than  a 
few  miles  to  go  to  covert  on  a  hunting  day,  and  that  he 
always  sent  them  by  road  twenty-four  hours  in  advance. 
Whether  Mr.  Meynell  did  so,  or  whether,  like  the  earlier 
Dukes  of  Beaufort  and  other  masters  of  older  time,  he  went 
for  a  week  or  two  at  a  stretch  to  some  outlying  district, 
I  am  not  able  to  say,  for  there  is  to  be  found  no  evidence 
one  way  or  the  other  :  the  one  fact  remains  that  several 
kennels  were  utilised  during  Mr.  Meynell's  mastership. 

Quornclon  Hall,  from  the  time  of  the  Ouorn's  first 
master,  came  to  be  regarded  as  a  sort  of  official  residence 
until  Lord  Southampton's  advent,  since  Lords  Sefton 
and  Foley,  Mr.  Assheton  Smith,  Mr.  Osbaldeston,  and 
Sir  Bellingham  Graham  bought  the  place  as  they  bought 
the  hunt  stock  and  fixtures.  Lord  Southampton,  follow- 
ing the  example  of  his  predecessors,  took  up  his  abode 
at  Quorndon  in  1827  ;  but  left  it  for  Belgrave  Hall,  near 
Leicester,  in  1829  or  1830,  while  at  the  same  time  he 
built  new  kennels  in  Humberstone  Gate,  Leicester.  But 
these  do  not  appear  to  have  been  very  well  arranged  or 
convenient  premises,  and  were  speedily  vacated  by  Sir 
Harry  Goodricke  (the  next  in  succession),  who,  regarding 
Thrussington  as  more  central  than  either  Leicester  or 
Quorndon,  put  up  new  kennels  there.  Sir  Harry's  pre- 
mature death,  however,  necessitated  the  choice  of  another 
master,  and  in  1838,  when  the  Thrussington  kennels  were 
scarcely  seven  years  old,  they  were  advertised  for  sale 
and  were  pulled  down  not  long  afterwards.  Another 
master  who  did  not  fancy  the  Quorndon  kennels  was 
Lord  Suffield,  who  signalised  the  beginning  of  his  brief 
reign  by  building  new  kennels  at  Billesdon  : 1  but  they 

1  The  design  for  these  kennels  is  said  to  have  been  furnished  by  Mr. 
Thomas  (not  Assheton)  Smith,  sometime  master  of  the  Hambledon,  Craven, 
and  Pytchley  hounds.     In  describing  the  new  kennels,  a  writer  of  the  time 


THE    QUORN    KENNELS  25 

were  occupied  for  one  season  only,  for  Mr.  Hodgson 
went  back  to  the  old  place,  but  had  a  second  kennel  at 
Oadby  for  the  sake  of  convenience  in  hunting  the  Market 
Harborough  side.  In  Mr.  Hodgson's  day,  in  fact  down 
to  Sir  Richard  Sutton's  time,  it  will  be  remembered  that 
what  is  now  Mr.  Fernie's  country  was  hunted  by  the 
Ouorn,  so  that  now  Market  Harborough  is  not  in  the 
latter  country  at  all,  but  is  situate  where  Mr.  Fernie's 
and  the  Pytchley  join. 

Since  Mr.  Sutton  took  the  Billesdon  or  South  Quorn 
country  from  his  father,  the  Ouorn  kennels  are  more 
central  than  they  used  to  be,  and  so  are  more  eligible 
than  ever,  and  though  of  most  unpretending  exterior, 
are  convenient  and  exceedingly  healthy. 

The  following  untechnical  description  of  the  Ouorn 
kennels,  taken  from  a  book  called  "  Music  and  Friends," 
by  William  Gardiner,  and  published  in  1838,  is  perhaps 
too  curious  to  be  left  out.  Speaking  of  Colonel  Cheney, 
of  Gadsby,  the  author  writes  : 

Near  the  colonel's  estate  are  the  dog-kennels  of  the  Melton 
Hunt,  a  college  for  rearing  and  educating  foxhounds.  It  is  com- 
posed of  several  buildings  occupying  some  acres ;  the  principal 
apartment  is  the  dinner  hall,  the  whole  being  filled  with  separate 
troughs,  at  each  of  which  four  dogs  feed  at  the  same  time.  The 
larder  is  a  spacious  place,  in  which  the  joints  of  six  or  seven 
horses  are  hung  up  every  week ;  the  whole  is  eaten  raw,  and  the 
gourmand  taste  of  these  animals  is  such  that  they  will  not  touch 
it  unless  it  has  been  seasonably  kept,  which  the  insupportable 
stench  that  surrounds  the  place  fully  proves.  In  the  kitchen  are 
conveniences  for  cooking 1  vegetable  diet,  of  which  oatmeal  forms 


remarked  "that  with  the  due  regard  to  economy  which  guided  all  Lord 
Sumeld's  proceedings,  there  is  a  weighing-machine  in  front  of  the  stables,  so 
that  the  Leicestershire  farmers  could  not  possibly  impose  upon  his  Lordship 
by  delivering  short  weight  in  corn,  straw,  or  hay."  On  this  matter,  however, 
see  pp.  178  and  179. 

1  Some  new  boilers  by  Messrs.  Barford  &  Perkins  of  Peterborough 
(Mr.  Barford,  well  known  in  connection  with  the  Peterborough  show,  died 
in  June  1898)  have  been  substituted  for  the  old  blue  coppers  previously 
in  use. 


26  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

the  principal  part.  The  litter-houses  comprise  numerous  berths 
for  the  mothers,  where  the  puppies  are  kept  until  they  are  ad- 
mitted into  the  junior  college.  In  this  building  are  lodged  the 
young  dogs  from  eight  to  twelve  months  old.  The  play-ground 
is  a  large  court  in  front,  neatly  flagged  and  always  clean.  A 
similar  one  is  on  the  western  side  for  the  older  dogs.  Nothing 
can  surpass  the  regularity  and  orderly  behaviour  of  these  intelli- 
gent creatures  at  the  dinner-hour;  on  the  ringing  of  the  bell,  the 
dogs  in  the  courtyard  wait  patiently  until  they  are  called  by  fours, 
when  Ponto,  Jowler,  Music,  and  Trinket  leave  the  crowd  and  go 
to  their  stated  troughs.  Other  parties  follow,  dine,  retire,  and 
make  way  for  the  remaining  sets.  The  kennelman  cracked  a 
long  whip  two  or  three  times  before  he  introduced  the  colonel 
and  myself  into  the  junior  court.  On  entering  I  was  surrounded 
by  a  score  of  playful  whelps,  who  all  pressed  forward  to  be 
caressed.  We  then  passed  into  the  court  of  the  grown-up 
gentry,  and  I  followed  with  very  different  feelings.  These 
gaunt  fellows  came  round  me  with  a  more  savage  look,  smelling 
my  person  in  such  numbers  that  I  scarcely  could  proceed. 
The  huntsman,  seeing  me  somewhat  alarmed,  called  out  to  two 
or  three  of  the  dogs  to  make  way,  and  said,  "  Come  on,  sir, 
don't  be  afraid."  I  was  glad  when  I  was  by  the  side  of  him  and 
his  long  whip,  but  should  not  have  been  so  easy  had  I  known 
that  a  kennelman,  who  had  got  up  in  the  night  to  appease  a 
quarrel  and  had  not  taken  the  precaution  to  put  on  his  clothes, 
had  been  devoured  by  the  dogs  in  consequence  of  not  being 
recognised  by  them.     They  picked  his  bones. 

How  many  versions  there  are  of  this  story,  and  of 
how  many  kennels  it  is  told,  it  would  be  difficult  to  say  : 
but  the  moral  perhaps  is  that  the  incident  never  occurred 
at  all — at  any  rate  let  us  hope  so. 

No  new  kennels  have  been  built  since  Lord  Suffield's 
time.  The  Marquis  of  Hastings,  it  is  true,  kept  some 
of  his  hounds  at  Donington  during  his  short  reign 
(1866-68)  ;  but  with  that  exception,  and  save  for  sundry 
alterations  and  repairs,  the  Ouorn  kennels  stand  very 
much  as  Mr.  Meynell  left  them.  The  lodging-rooms 
have  cupola  roofs  covered  with  the  old  Swithland  slate, 
which  is  now  almost  unobtainable. 


THE    QUORN    HOUNDS  27 


THE    QUORN    HOUNDS 

IN  attempting  to  sketch  an  outline  history  of  the 
Ouorn,  the  foxhound  problem  confronts  one  directly. 
It  is,  for  instance,  quite  impossible  to  discover  the 
source  whence  Mr.  Boothby  obtained  his  original  pack 
of  hounds,  which  he  must  have  started  about  the  year 
1697.  At  that  time  there  were  very  few  regular  fox- 
hunting establishments,  and  it  could  not  then  have  been 
an  easy  matter  to  make  up  a  scratch  pack  with  drafts 
from  various  kennels.  This  is  not  the  place  in  which 
to  indulge  in  theories  concerninor  the  evolution  of  the 
foxhound,  which  I  take  leave  to  regard  as  just  such 
another  composite  animal  as  is  the  blood  horse. 

As  these  pages  will  show,  the  Ouorn  Hunt  has  a 
history  of  something  like  two  hundred  years  ;  but, 
except  in  an  indirect  sense,  the  present  occupants  of 
the  kennel  have  no  such  long  lineage,  because,  since  the 
youthful  Mr.  Boothby  first  began  to  hunt  the  country, 
packs  have  been  dispersed  time  after  time,  and  it  is 
only  through  chance  strains,  if  any  such  exist,  that  the 
present  Ouorn  hounds  can  have  any  relationship  with 
Mr.  Meynell's  famous  pack. 

The  pack  of  which  Mr.  Boothby  was  possessed  was 
taken  over,  so  far  as  one  can  discover,  by  Mr.  Meynell 
in  1753,  and  that  great  master  of  hunting,  by  judicious 
breeding,  no  doubt  improved  them  very  much  ;  and  they 
in  turn  were  sold  to  Lord  Sefton,  who  added  to  them 
his  hounds  with  which,  from  Combe  Abbey,  he  had 
been  hunting  a  part  of  Oxfordshire.      It   is   reasonable 


28  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

to  assume  that  Mr.  Meynell's  hounds  were  crossed  with 
those  of  Lord  Sefton  ;  but  we  have  it  on  the  authority 
of  "  The  Druid "  that  Mr.  John  Warde  would  never 
send  to  Mr.  Meynell's  kennel  for  new  blood.  He  by 
some  means  obtained  a  couple  of  Mr.  Meynell's  cast- 
offs,  named  them  Oueer'em  and  Quornite,  and  used  to 
show  them  to  his  friends  as  the  "sort  of  things  the 
Ouorn  people  hunt  foxes  with."  At  any  rate,  whatever 
the  Ouorn  pack  was  like  in  1805,  when  Lord  Sefton  gave 
up  the  country  after  a  five  years'  reign,  so  it  passed 
into  the  hands  of  Lord  Foley,  his  successor,  who  held 
the  country  for  a  single  season  only,  and  by  that  time, 
by  whose  fault  one  cannot  tell,  the  pack  had  very  much 
deteriorated,  and  were  dispersed,  not  being  good  enough 
for  his  successor,  Mr  Assheton  Smith,  to  take  to.  Mr. 
Musters  gave  up  the  Nottinghamshire  country  in  1806, 
when  Mr.  Smith  took  the  Quorn,  so  the  latter  gave  the 
former  a  thousand  guineas  for  his  hounds  ;  he  obtained 
some  from  Belvoir  and  other  kennels,  and  began  his 
eleven  years'  mastership.  On  his  resignation  he  took 
his  hounds  and  horses  into  Lincolnshire,  and  Mr.  Osbal- 
deston,  on  becoming  the  next  master  of  the  Quorn, 
brought  his  own  ready-made  pack  from  the  Atherstone 
country.  Sir  Bellingham  Graham  had  to  find  some  of 
his  own  hounds  though  he  bought  a  few  from  his  pre- 
decessor, who  took  the  rest  away  when  he  went  into 
Hampshire,  and  brought  them  back  in  a  couple  of 
years  when  he  returned  to  Ouorn,  and  then  after  a 
few  years'  rule  he  took  away  the  pick  of  the  pack  to 
succeed  Mr.  Musters  in  the  Pytchley  country. 

Mr.  Osbaldeston  left  a  few  old  and  blemished  hounds, 
and  they  were  not  even  sound.  To  these  Lord  South- 
ampton added  some  from  Mr.  Nicholls,  who  then  hunted 
the  New  Forest,  but  they  were  mostly  suffering  from 
kennel  lameness  ;  a  few  came  from  Mr.  Musters,  and  a 
few  from  Belvoir.     The  next  step  was  to  sell  or  make 


THE    QUORN    HOUNDS  29 

away  with  most  of  this  rubbish  and  buy  the  Oakley,  Lord 
Tavistock  having  just  given  up  the  country  ;  and  after 
a  time  he  sold  these  to  Mr.  Russell  of  Warwickshire, 
and  bought  in  their  stead  Lord  Petres'  Essex  Union 
hounds,  adding  to  them  the  pack  of  Mr.  Shaw. 

After  Mr.  Errington's  resignation  in  1838,  Lord 
Chesterfield  bought  his  hounds  to  take  into  the  Pytchley 
country,  and  Lord  Suffield,  who  comes  next  on  the  list, 
bought  the  Lambton  hounds  for  three  thousand  guineas, 
and  after  a  year  sold  them  for  one  third  of  that  sum  ;  so 
Mr.  Hodgson  brought  with  him  to  the  Ouorn  country 
the  hounds  with  which  he  had  been  hunting  the  Holder- 
ness  country,  and  on  his  resignation  in  1841  they  were 
sold,  Lord  Ducie  taking  the  bitch  pack  at  a  thousand 
guineas.  Mr.  Greene  was  the  buyer  of  some  of  the 
lots,  but  when  Sir  Richard  Sutton  succeeded  Mr.  Greene 
in  1 847  he  brought  his  own  pack  from  the  Cottesmore, 
which  necessitated  Mr.  Greene's  hounds  being  dispersed. 
About  a  month  after  Sir  Richard  Sutton's  death  his 
hounds  were  sold  at  Tattersall's,  seventy  couples  realis- 
ing 1 82 1  guineas,  by  no  means  a  large  price  when  it  is 
remembered  that  their  deceased  owner  had  given  the 
utmost  attention  to  them  ever  since  he  first  took  the 
Burton  country  in  1824.  They  had  been  bred  with  the 
utmost  care,  and  amongst  the  buyers  were  Lord  Stam- 
ford, who  succeeded  Sir  Richard  Sutton,  Mr.  Richard 
Sutton,  Mr.  Drake,  Mr.  Morrell,  Mr.  Collier,  and  the 
committee  of  the  Cheshire  Hunt.  Lord  Stamford 
taking  the  lots  he  had  purchased  at  Sir  Richard 
Sutton's  sale  as  a  nucleus,  added  thereto  the  hounds 
with  which  Mr.  Shaw-Hellier,  a  breeder  of  great  ex- 
perience, had  been  hunting  the  Southwold  country,  which 
he  resigned  in  1855  ;  while  he  also  bought  the  Bedale 
hounds  from  Mr.  Mark  Milbank,  the  Duke  of  Cleve- 
land's son-in-law,  who  gave  up  the  country  in  the  same 
year  in  which   Mr.  Shaw-Hellier  retired  from  Lincoln- 


30  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

shire.  Several  couples  were  also  obtained  from  other 
good  kennels,  so  that  Lord  Stamford  found  himself  in 
possession  of  a  really  good  lot  of  hounds,  and  on  his 
resignation  he  sold  the  pack  to  his  successor,  Mr. 
Clowes,  who  after  a  three  years'  rule  retired  and  offered 
his  kennel  for  sale.  To  the  surprise  of  all,  it  was  dis- 
covered that  the  Marquis  of  Hastings  had  purchased 
about  half  the  pack,  and  he  after  two  years  of  failure 
held  a  sale,  the  fourth  within  thirteen  years.  Mr. 
Musters,  who  came  from  South  Notts  in  succession  to 
the  marquis,  brought  his  own  hounds  with  him  into 
Leicestershire,  and  took  them  home  again  after  an 
attempt  at  a  partnership  with  Mr.  Coupland  had  failed  ; 
so  the  latter  gentleman,  having  to  cast  about  for  a  pack, 
selected  the  Craven,  which  were  then  in  the  market, 
owing  to  the  resignation  of  Mr.  G.  S.  Willes.  And  these 
hounds,  although  they  were  subsequently  more  than 
decimated  by  dumb  madness,  are  the  ancestors  of  the 
present  pack,  which  have  done  so  well  at  Peterborough 
and  in  the  field  ;  and,  in  the  interests  of  an  historic  hunt, 
it  is  to  be  hoped  that  the  day  is  far  distant  when  any 
future  master  of  the  Quorn  may  have  to  get  together 
a  scratch  pack,  a  strait  to  which  former  masters  have 
been  reduced.  Such  a  contingency,  however,  is  scarcely 
possible,  as  some  years  ago  Lord  Wilton,  Mr.  Behrens, 
and  the  Duke  of  Portland  (who  for  some  seasons  hunted 
from  Melton)  purchased  the  Ouorn  hounds,  so  as  to 
secure  them  to  the  country.  On  the  death  of  Lord 
Wilton  his  share  was  purchased  by  the  Hon.  Montague 
Curzon,  of  Beaumanor.  The  Duke  of  Portland,  on 
giving  up  hunting  in  Leicestershire,  liberally  presented 
his  third  share  to  the  hunt,  while  the  members  thereof 
purchased  the  one-third  share  of  Mr.  Behrens's  executors 
when  that  gentleman  died,  so  that  at  the  present  time 
two  out  of  the  three  shares  belong  to  the  hunt. 

Considerations  of  space  preclude  any  detailed  history 


THE    QUORN    HOUNDS 


3i 


of  the  breeding  of  the  pack,  but  mention  must  be  made 
of  Alfred  and  Watchman,  who  came  in  a  Belvoir  draft ; 
and  so,  too,  did  Contest,  who  brought  in  some  of  the 
Berkeley  blood.  Since  that  time  the  Quorn  have  bred 
their  own  hounds.  The  best  bitches  have  been  sent  to 
some  of  the  most  noted  stallion  hounds  in  England, 
while  at  the  present  time  (August  1898)  the  kennel 
has  some  excellent  sires  of  its  own  ;  but  Warwickshire 
Hermit  and  other  stallion  hounds  have  been  utilised. 


CHAPTER    II 

MR.  THOMAS    BOOTHBY 
MR.  MEYNELL    (1753-1800) 


33 


CHAPTER    II 
MR.  THOMAS   BOOTHBY 

IT  is  now  a  good  many  years  ago  since  a  brilliant 
horseman,  who  annually  betook  himself  to  Melton 
Mowbray,  defined  an  ideal  hunting  country  as  one  which 
should  contain  no  covert  which  hounds  could  not  draw 
thoroughly  in  twenty  minutes,  and  whose  surface  should 
show  no  hill  long  enough,  or  steep  enough,  to  blow  a 
horse  in  good  condition.  To  these  not  inconsiderable 
advantages  the  sportsman  might  have  added  the  entire 
absence  of  plough,  of  any  fence  which  the  best  com- 
bination of  man  and  horse  could  not  surmount,  and,  as 
a  matter  of  course,  that  no  wire,  barbed  or  otherwise, 
should  lurk  in  unsuspected  places. 

If  Leicestershire  cannot  entirely  comply  with  all  these 
requirements,  it  remains,  at  any  rate,  the  acknowledged 
headquarters  of  fox-hunting,  while  its  physical  character- 
istics have  attracted  the  unbounded  admiration  of  suc- 
cessive generations  of  fox-hunters  for  at  least  a  century. 
"  Nimrod  "  began  his  Leicestershire  hunting  tour  with 
the  words  that  Leicestershire  "may  justly  be  deno- 
minated the  Montpelier  of  hunting  countries  ;  in  the 
eyes  of  a  sportsman  it  is  a  Vale  of  Cashmere,  and  in 
comparison  with  it  all  others  retire  longo  intervallo." 
"Nimrod"  perhaps  acts  the  part  of  fugleman  in  prais- 
ing Leicestershire,  and  from  that  day  to  this  to  take 
up  a  pen  to  write  about  Leicestershire  has  been  to  laud 
it.      Its  rich   soil   is  favourable   for  holding  a  scent,  its 

o 

35 


$6  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

wide  enclosures,  its  few  large  coverts,  and  the  famous 
men  who  have  been  connected  with  it,  are  among  the 
reasons  of  its  celebrity  and  popularity.  It  is  elsewhere 
mentioned  that,  in  olden  days,  Leicestershire  was  not 
the  stiffly  fenced  country  it  now  is,  and  the  Rev.  J. 
Curtis,  who  wrote  a  history  of  Leicestershire,  remarked, 
when  speaking  of  hunting,  that  the  fences  offered  no 
danger,  "being  chiefly  quicksets,"  not  the  most  insig- 
nificant obstacles  to-day. 

Hunting,  however,  was  evidently  known  to  Leicester 
men  prior  to  the  time  of  Mr.  Boothby,  for  Throsley, 
in  his  "  History  of  Leicester,"  makes  mention  of  an 
"  innocent  holiday "  which  had  been  dying  out  since 
1707,  and  which  must  therefore  have  been  in  full  swing 
years  before.  On  Easter  Monday  it  seems  to  have 
been  the  custom  for  the  Mayor  and  Corporation,  clad 
in  their  robes,  to  go  to  a  certain  close  near  the  town 
to  see  a  travesty  of  hunting.  A  kind  of  gymkhana 
took  place  in  the  morning,  and  then  about  noon  the 
aniseeded  carcass  of  a  dead  cat  was  fastened  by  a  string 
to  a  horse's  tail  and  dragged  over  the  ground  "in  zigzag 
directions."  Half-an-hour  later  the  hounds  were  laid 
on,  and  "gave  tongue  in  glorious  concert,"  the  people 
on  the  hills  shouted,  and  "the  horsemen,  dashing  after 
the  hounds  through  foul  passages  and  over  fences,  were 
emulous  of  taking  the  lead  over  their  fellows."  A  regular 
cockney  business  truly,  and  worthy  to  rank  with  the 
Epping  Hunt  on  Easter  Monday  when  Colonel  Thornton 
was  Master  of  the  Ceremonies,  but  in  the  eyes  of  the 
historian  "  it  was  a  scene,  upon  the  whole,  of  joy,  the 
governing  and  the  governed  in  the  habits  of  freedom 
enjoying  together  an  innocent  and  recreative  amuse- 
ment, serving  to  unite  them  in  the  bonds  of  friendship 
rather  than  embitter  their  days  with  discord  and  dis- 
union." This  is  praise  for  the  drag,  indeed;  but  as  the 
cat  was  eventually  dragged  through  the  principal  streets 


MR.    THOMAS    BOOTHBY  37 

to  the   Mayor's  door,  that  functionary  was  expected  to 
entertain  all  comers. 

The   Quorn   country,   with   which   alone    I    am   con- 
cerned,  came   into   notoriety  all   at  once   owing  to  the 
skill  and  measure  of  success  which  attended  the  forty- 
seven  years'  mastership  of  the  famous   Hugo  Meynell, 
of  Bradley,  Derbyshire,  who  has  been  called  the  "  Pri- 
mate of  the  Science."     He  had,  indeed,  a  predecessor, 
for  Mr.  Thomas  Boothby  was  master  of  a  pack  of  fox- 
hounds in   Leicestershire  for  fifty-five  years  ;  but  of  the 
sport  enjoyed  during  this  long  period  we  know  less  than 
we  know  of  any  single  day  at  the  present  time.      It  is, 
however,  improbable  in  the  extreme  that  the  sportsmen 
who  lived  before   Mr.   Boothby  were  unappreciative  of 
the   merits   of  this,  the  par  excellence  hunting  ground, 
though  at  that  time  popular  appreciation  may  have  run 
more  in  favour  of  Charnwood   Forest  than  of  the  open 
country.     Charnwood    Forest  was  a  royal   preserve   as 
long  ago  as  the  time  of  William  the  Conqueror,  who 
being  a  keen  sportsman,  as  the  term  was  then  under- 
stood— that  is  to  say,  an  intensely  selfish  one — forbade 
the   peasants  to  feed  their  pigs  within   its   boundaries  ; 
and  this  is  about  the  first  historical  fact  we  hear  of  in 
connection  with  it.      The  monks  of  Alverscroft  Priory 
kept  hawks  and  an  establishment  of  hounds  up  to  the 
year   1539,  when  the   Priory  was  surrendered  to  Henry 
VIII.,  at  which  time  its  glades  are  said  to  have  sheltered 
the  wild  red  deer.     The  "Cowering  hills  of  Charnwood," 
wrote   another    chronicler,    "  once   so   famous    in    olden 
times,  when  the  renowned  Earls  of  Leicester,  Winches- 
ter,  and   Bogham,    and   other   great   people,    with  their 
high-born   dames    and    numerous    retinues,    made   those 
hills  and  vales  resound  to  the  music  of  horn  and  hound, 
which  attract  the  villagers  to  this  all-exhilarating  sport." 
Quorndon  Abbey  was  not  far  from  Charnwood,  and  its 
monks   once   laid    serious   complaint    against    one   John 


38  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

Comyns  "for  that  he  did  once  kill  a  hundred  wild  hogs 
in  the  Forest  of  Charnwood,"  that  being,  it  was  alleged, 
considerably  in  excess  of  the  number  he  was  entitled  to 
slay.  This  was  one  of  the  earliest  hunting  disputes  on 
record,  and  after  the  matter  had  been  made  the  subject 
of  a  trial,  the  sporting  rights  over  Charnwood  Forest 
were  divided. 

Charnwood,  however,  kept  up  its  reputation  for 
sport,  and  in  this  wise  does  Drayton  speak  of  the  forest 
and  its  surroundings — 

Oh  Charnwood  !  be  thou  called  the  choicest  of  thy  kind, 
The  like  in  any  place  what  flood  hath  hapt  to  find  ? 
No  tract  in  all  this  isle,  the  proudest  let  her  be, 
Can  show  a  sylvan  nymph  for  beauty  like  to  thee ; 
The  Satyrs  and  the  Fauns,  by  Dian  set  to  keep 
Rough  hills  and  forest  holts  were  sadly  seen  to  weep, 
When  thy  high  palmed  harts,  the  sport  of  boors  and  hounds, 
By  gripple  borderers'  hands  were  banished  thy  grounds. 

In  the  year  1805,  the  year  in  which  Mr.  Meynell 
died,  the  Act  of  Enclosure  was  passed. 

Such  was  the  Quorn  Hunt  of  antiquity.  The  harts 
and  hogs  no  doubt  found  plenty  of  sport  for  successive 
generations  of  boors  and  others,  and  in  due  time,  we 
may  take  it,  the  marten,  cat,  and  the  fox  came  to  be 
pursued  ;  but  we  have  no  definite  information  concern- 
ing Leicestershire  fox-hunting  until  we  find  Mr.  Thomas 
Boothby  at  the  head  of  an  establishment  at  the  latter 
end  of  the  seventeenth  century.  The  date  at  which  this 
gentleman  was  born,  hunted,  and  died  would  probably 
have  not  been  generally  known  were  it  not  for  the  fact 
that  in  the  Field  for  the  6th  of  November  1875,  there 
appeared  an  engraving  of  Squire  Boothby's  hunting-horn 
— a  perfectly  straight  horn.  The  sketch  was  sent  to  the 
paper  by  Mr.  Reginald  Corbet,  of  Adderley,  Master  of 
the  South  Cheshire  Hounds.  The  lower  portion  of  the 
horn  is  of  silver,  and  the  upper  part  towards  the  mouth- 


MR.    THOMAS    BOOTHBY  39 

piece  is  of  some  greenish  material,  and  the  whole  instru- 
ment must  be  about  eighteen  inches  long.  This  old 
horn  bears  the  inscription  :  "Thomas  Boothby,  Esquire, 
of  Tooley  Park,  Leicestershire.  With  this  horn  he 
hunted  the  first  pack  of  foxhounds  then  in  England 
fifty- five  years.  Born  1677;  died  I752-  Now  the  pro- 
perty of  Thomas  D'Avenant,  Esquire,  County  of  Salop, 
his  grandson."  If,  by  the  way,  Mr.  Boothby  himself 
hunted  his  hounds,  there  is  at  once  a  contradiction  of 
the  statement  that  Assheton  Smith  was  the  first  amateur 
huntsman  in  Leicestershire. 

Since  the  engraving  of  the  horn  first  appeared,  it  has 
sometimes  been  thought  that  "  the  first  pack  of  fox- 
hounds then  in  England  "  meant  the  first  pack  ever 
started  ;  but  this  we  know  cannot  be  the  meaning  in- 
tended, as  one  or  two  hunts,  the  Charlton  (afterwards 
the  Goodwood)  were  in  existence  before  Mr.  Boothby 
could  have  kept  hounds.  As  he  died  in  1752  and  hunted 
his  country  for  fifty-five  years,  he  must,  assuming  that 
he  kept  hounds  until  the  day  of  his  death,  have  taken 
the  country  in  1697,  when  he  was  no  more  than  twenty 
years  of  age.  Tooley  Park,  Mr.  Boothby's  residence,  is 
now  in  the  Atherstone  country,  not  far  from  the  fixture 
Peckleton,  in  which  place  the  name  of  Boothby  is  still 
respected,  and  it  is  said  (in  a  letter  from  the  Honour- 
able and  Reverend  Augustus  Byron,  printed  in  Mrs. 
Chaworth  Muster's  "  Hunting  Songs  and  Sport  ")  that 
the  old  M.F.H.  gave  to  the  parish  a  peal  of  bells,  which 
were  so  tuned  "  as  to  resemble  the  cry  of  a  pack  of 
hounds."  How  to  accomplish  this  would,  nowadays, 
probably  puzzle  the  most  skilful  campanologist.  In  the 
same  communication  the  writer  states  that  Mr.  Boothby 
is  credited  with  having  altered  the  pattern  of  the  hunt- 
ing-horn, instituting  a  straight  instrument  for  that  seen 
in  old  pictures,  and  slung  round  the  body.  In  the  year 
1885  there  was  an  interesting  correspondence  in  /Votes 


4o  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

and  Queries  on  the  subject  of  hunting-horns.  Some  of 
the  contributors  thereto  were  of  opinion  that  in  olden 
times  huntsmen  of  foxhound  packs  wore  the  French 
horn  slung  round  the  body.  Various  reasons  are  put 
forth  in  favour  of  the  French  horn,  but  none  of  them 
are  anything  like  conclusive.  Prior  to  the  fourth  Duke 
of  Richmond  givinc-  his  foxhounds  to  the  Prince  of 
Wales  in  or  about  the  year  1813,  the  French  horn  was 
unquestionably  used  by  the  huntsman  of  the  royal  pack  ; 
but  on  the  hunt  being  remodelled,  and  whippers-in 
being  substituted  for  the  old  yeomen  prickers,  a  horn  of 
the  present  pattern — one  slightly  curved,  and  carried, 
not  in  a  case  like  the  straight  horn  used  with  foxhounds, 
but  slung  over  the  shoulder  with  a  strap — was  adopted. 
One  of  the  contributors  to  the  discussion  sought  to 
uphold  the  French  horn  by  quoting  a  line  from  an  old 
hunting  song- — 

And  the  huntsman  winds  his  horn. 

The  expression  "winds,"  he  thought,  "seems  to  con- 
vey some  idea  of  curvature."  Thereupon  ensued  an 
argument  as  to  the  meaning  and  pronunciation  of 
the  word  "  winds."  It  surely,  so  far  from  suggesting 
"curvature,"  means  simply  that  the  huntsman  blew  it  ; 
and  the  story  is  related  of  Dr.  Johnson,  when  asked  to 
decide  whether  it  should  be  wind  or  wind,  having  made 
reply,  "  I  cannot  find  it  in  my  mind  to  call  it  wind  ; 
but  I  can  find  it  in  my  mind  to  call  it  wind." 

As  already  mentioned,  of  the  details  of  Mr.  Boothby's 
establishment  we  know  nothing.  It  may  be  assumed, 
however,  that  in  the  course  of  fifty-five  years  the  game 
was  found  to  be  worth  the  candle,  or  the  hounds  would 
have  been  given  up.  Tooley  Park,  according  to  Nicholl's 
"  History  of  Leicestershire,"  was  purchased  by  Judith, 
Lady  Corbett.  Mr.  Boothby,  our  M.F.H.,  was  the  son 
of  Lady  Corbett   by  her  first  husband,  and  at  Tooley 


MR.    THOMAS    BOOTHBY  41 

Park  they  lived  from  about  the  year  1 64S.  The  Boothby 
family  would  appear  to  have  been  more  or  less  addicted 
to  racing,  for  under  date  1st  November  1672,  five 
years  before  Mr.  Thomas  Boothby  was  born,  is  the 
entry  in  Isham's  diary:1  "Nov.  1672. — We  heard  that 
Mr.  Bainbridge  had  won  ^5  at  Harleston  Races  on 
the  race  between  Mr.  Hanbury  and  Mr.  Boothby, 
and  Saunders  won  ^3.  They  also  said  that  Boothby 
challenged  Hanbury  to  run  him  for  ^100."  Mr. 
Boothby  the  master  of  hounds  married  a  Miss  Scrim- 
shire  or  Scrymshire,  a  lady  possessed  of  a  considerable 
amount  of  property,  and  took  her  name  in  addition  to 
his  own.  His  son,  who  predeceased  him,  had  a  son, 
and  daughter,  Anne.  The  latter  married,  as  his  second 
wife,  Mr.  Hugo  Meynell,  who  succeeded  Mr.  Boothby 
in  the  mastership  of  the  hounds.  The  Gentleman  s 
Magazine  for  August  1752  records  Mr.  Boothby's  death 
in  these  words :  "  Thomas  Boothby,  of  Tooley  Park, 
Esquire,  Leicestershire,  one  of  the  greatest  sportsmen 
in  Enoland." 

The  Boothbys  were  a  very  old  family,  and  Mrs. 
Boothby,  an  elegant  woman,  was  likewise  sprung  from 
an  ancient  stock,  for  Mr.  J.  Cradock,  jun.,  in  his 
"  Literary  and  Miscellaneous  Memoirs,"  published  in 
1828,  wrote  that,  before  he  went  to  the  jubilee  of 
George  III.,  Mrs.  Boothby,  of  Tooley  Park,  requested 
him  to  obtain  any  information  as  to  "  her  family  of  the 
Cloptons  who  were  connected  with  Shakespeare."  This 
Mrs.  Boothby  was  a  lady  not  only  of  commanding 
presence,  but  of  much  celebrity  during  the  later  years 
of  George  II.  and  the  beginning  of  the  reign  of  George 
III.,  and  at  that  time,  as  Lord  Denbigh  declared,  she 
"  disposed  of  more  preferment  in  the  county  of  Leicester 
amongst  her  friends  than  any  other  person  whatever." 

Fielding,   the   novelist,   was   closely   connected   with 

1  "  History  of  Newmarket,"  by  J.  P.  Hore,  vol.  iii.  p.  126. 


42  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

the  Boothbys,  and  it  was  always  supposed  that  more 
than  one  character  in  "Tom  Jones"  was  drawn  from 
the  Tooley  Park  district,  while  Mrs.  Boothby  is  said 
to  have  been  the  original  of  Sophia  Western. 

On  another  page  it  is  stated  that  Mr.  Meynell 
married  a  grand-daughter  of  Mr.  Boothby's,  that  lady 
being  sister  to  "  Prince "  Boothby,  as  Mr.  Boothby's 
grandson  was  called,  on  account  of  his  reputed  love  for 
the  society  of  great  people,  and  his  grand  way  of  doing 
things.  He  appears  to  have  hunted  to  a  certain  extent, 
and  lived  with  Mr.  Meynell  at  Langton  Hall ;  but  never 
became  famous  in  the  hunting-field.  He  was,  as  a 
chronicler  described  him,  "  a  very  respectable  gentle- 
man," among  whose  particular  friends  were  the  Duke 
of  Rutland,  Lords  Carlisle  and  Derby,  and  Charles  James 
Fox.  He  was  somewhat  eccentric  in  his  dress ;  but 
his  distinguishing  feature  was  his  hat,  as  he  declined 
to  go  with  the  ever-changing  fashion,  and  clung  to  the 
same  shape  for  twenty  years.  With  respect  to  his 
weakness  for  the  society  of  great  people,  it  was  said 
of  him  that  he  would  at  any  moment  leave  the  com- 
pany of  a  companion  to  walk  with  one  of  higher  de- 
gree. He  had  chambers  in  Clarges  Street,  Piccadilly, 
and  there,  after  breakfasting  off  cold  tea,  and  riding  his 
hack  in  the  Park,  he  blew  out  his  brains  with  a  great 
horse-pistol  because,  in  his  own  words,  he  was  "  tired 
of  the  bore  of  dressing  and  undressing-." 


MR.    MEYNELL  43 


MR.    MEYNELL 

i753-1800 

HOWEVER  good  a  sportsman  Mr.  Boothby  may 
have  been,  he  was,  at  any  rate  in  popular  esti- 
mation, distanced  by  the  glories  of  his  successor,  Mr. 
Hugo  Meynell.  Though  said  to  have  been  descended 
from  a  family  of  long  standing  in  Leicestershire  and 
Derbyshire,  Mr.  Meynell  at  the  time  he  took  the 
Quorn  country  in  1753  owned  not  an  acre  of  land 
in  the  county,  though  he  very  soon  left  Langton  Hall 
and  bought  from  Laurence,  Earl  Ferrers,  Ouorndon 
Hall,  whither  he  removed  the  hounds  (previously  kept 
at  Bowden  Inn),  and  Ouorndon  Hall  has  since  that 
time  been  the  residence  of  several  masters  of  the  Quorn. 
Temporary  kennels  appear  to  have  been  erected  at 
first,  but  those  now  in  use  were  built  certainly  not  later 
than  1758.  Being  born  in  June  1735  (this  is  doubtful, 
see  post,  p.  66),  Mr.  Meynell  could  have  been  but 
eighteen  years  of  age  when  he  first  undertook  the 
arduous  task  of  hunting  the  wide-stretching  Quorn 
country ;  and  one  of  his  first  acts  after  becoming 
M.F.H.  was  to  make  a  cock-fighting  match  against 
Sir  Charles  Sedley,  to  fight  twice  a  year,  for  five  years, 
at  Ashbourne  and  Nottingham  alternately.  The  stakes 
were  ten  guineas  a  battle,  and  500  guineas  the  odd 
battle.  Sir  Charles  Sedley  was  to  be  assisted  by  all 
Mr.  Neal's  cocks,  and  Mr.  Meynell  was  to  have  as 
many  of  Sir  Lynch  Cotton's  birds  as  he  required. 

Mr.  Meynell  was  no  Squire  Western.     He  was  quite 


44  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

a  society  man  ;  a  very  good  musician,  and  quite  a  fair 
violinist.  On  the  22nd  February  1760,  while  Laurence 
Earl  Ferrers  was  lying  under  sentence  of  death  for  the 
murder  of  his  steward,  Mr.  Meynell  joined  in  readily 
with  the  local  festivities.  The  master  and  the  members 
of  the  hunt  gave  a  ball,  to  which  they  invited  the 
residents  of  the  neighbourhood,  as  well  as  the  officers 
of  the  Suffolk  Militia,  which  regiment  happened  to  be 
quartered  in  Leicester.  The  ball  was  opened  at  seven 
o'clock  in  the  old  Guildhall,  when  the  supper,  consist- 
ing of  one  hundred  and  sixty  dishes,  supplied  by  the 
landlord  of  the  Cranes  Inn,  appears  to  have  been  all 
that  could  be  desired,  and  "  two  hundred  persons  of 
distinction"  refreshed  exhausted  nature.  What  time  the 
company  broke  up  after  "meeting"  at  seven  is  not 
stated. 

Mr.  Meynell  and  his  friends  also  patronised  theat- 
ricals, for  so  long  ago  as  1760  Messrs.  Darrawan's 
Company  performed  at  Leicester,  by  special  desire  of 
the  Hunt,  the  comedy  of  "  Love  for  Love,"  while  on 
the  following  evening  the  "  Beggars'  Opera "  and  a 
harlequin  entertainment  were  given,  the  latter  being 
especially  applauded.  On  several  subsequent  occa- 
sions, too,  travelling  companies  were  in  request  at 
the  Leicester  theatre,  and  in  1776  the  "Suspicious 
Husband,"  by  the  late  ingenious  Dr.  B.  Hoadley,  "was 
played  by  request";  the  after-piece  was  "The  Deuce 
is  in  Him,"  and  a  day  or  two  afterwards  "Macbeth" 
made  up  the  programme. 

Mr.  Meynell  was  High  Sheriff  for  Derbyshire  in 
1758,  and  between  the  years  1761  and  1778  he  had  sat 
in  Parliament  as  representing  in  succession  Lichfield, 
Lymington,  and  Stafford.  The  Gentleman  s  Magazine  1 
says  that  from  1770  to  1772  Mr.  Meynell  was  Master 
of  the    Royal    Buckhounds,   a    statement    I    have    seen 

1  Vol.  Ixxxviii.  (1808),  p.  1 1 34. 


MR.    MEYNELL  45 

made  in  no  other  place.1  Moreover,  it  is  in  the  highest 
degree  improbable  that  he  could  have  combined  the 
two  masterships,  while  we  have  nowhere  the  slightest 
hint  that  he  ever  suspended  his  own  hunt  or  found  a 
substitute  for  the  years  during  which  he  is  said  to  have 
ruled  the  buckhounds. 

Before  Mr.  Meynell  came  of  age,  that  is  to  say  in 
1754  (one  year  after  taking  the  country),  he  married  as 
his  first  wife  Miss  Anne  Gell  of  Hopton  Hall,  Derby- 
shire,2 by  whom  he  had  one  son,  Godfrey ;  and  she 
dying  there  in  1757,  he  next  married  Anne,  daughter 
of  Mr.  Thomas  Boothby  Scrimshire  or  Scrymshire,  of 
Tooley  Park,  this  lady  being  grand-daughter  of  Mr. 
Thomas  Boothby,  his  predecessor  in  the  Ouorn  country, 
and  sister  of  "  Prince "  Boothby,  who  lived  with  Mr. 
Meynell  at  Langton  Hall  when  he  first  took  the  hounds. 
By  his  second  wife  Mr.  Meynell  had  two  sons,  Hugo, 
born  in  1759,  and  Charles,  born  in  1768. 

The  situation  of  Ouorndon  Hall  no  doubt  first 
attracted  Mr.  Meynell's  attention,  since  it  is  near 
Charnwood  Forest,  a  place  not  loved  by  the  Leicester- 
shire fox-hunter  of  to-day,  but  which  must  have  appeared 
quite  a  paradise  in  Mr.  Meynell's  eyes  as  a  schooling 
ground  for  his  younger  hounds  ;  moreover,  his  country 
extended  nearly  from  Nottingham  to  Harborough. 
According  to  the  anonymous  author  of  "  Memoirs  of 
the  Belvoir  Hounds,"  Mr.  Meynell  had  some  dispute 
about  country  boundaries  ;  so  a  very  business-like  docu- 
ment was  drawn  up  between  Mr.  Noel  of  the  Cottes- 
more and  himself,  and  the  affair  was  settled  without 
difficulty.     At  page  10  of  the  book,  which  was  published 


1  If  Mr.  Meynell  ever  did  hold  this  office  it  appears  strange  that  nothing 
should  have  been  known  of  it  ;  but  it  is  a  coincidence  that  Mr.  J.  P.  Hore, 
who  compiled  a  list  of  masters  from  authentic  sources,  is  unable  to  say  with 
certainty  who  was  master  between  1770  and  1772. 

2  Now  the  residence  of  Mr.  Chandos  Pole  Gell. 


46  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

in  1867,  a  copy  of  the  agreement  is   set  out,   but  it   is 
unnecessary  to  reproduce  it  here. 

Of  the  details  of  Mr.  Meynell's  early  hunting  estab- 
lishment and  exploits  we  know  but  little.  From  1791, 
however,  to  1800  we  have  a  tolerably  good  record  of  the 
sport  enjoyed,  since  Joseph  Jones,  known  as  "Cork-legged 
Jones,"  from  his  having,  like  the  first  Marquis  of  Angle- 
sey, a  cork  leg,  kept  a  diary  which  was  published  in  the 
year  18 16.  The  book  was  dedicated  to  the  Duke  of 
Rutland.  When  Mr.  Meynell  first  began  to  hunt  the 
country  he  used  to  take  out  an  enormous  number  of 
hounds  ;  but  experience  soon  taught  him  that  an  un- 
wieldy pack  was  more  plague  than  profit  in  the  field,  so 
he  by  degrees  cut  down  the  number  until  during  his  last 
five-and-twenty  years  of  mastership  he  is  said  never  to 
have  taken  out  more  than  twenty  couples,  and  often 
fewer  than  that.  To  some  of  the  runs  of  which  we  have 
record  no  dates  are  given,  but  when  the  close  of  the 
eighteenth  century  was  within  measurable  distance  it 
was  said  that  Mr.  Meynell's  hounds  "had  more  good 
runs  than  any  pack  in  England,"  a  statement  which  is 
partly  borne  out  by  Jones's  diary.  Mr.  Hawkes,  the 
author  of  a  very  scarce  treatise  called  the  "  Meynellian 
Science "  (which  gives  an  account  of  Mr.  Meynell's 
theories  and  practice),  refers  to  two  runs  which  fell  to 
the  lot  of  Mr.  Meynell's  pack.  One  lasted  for  an  hour 
and  twenty  minutes,  when,  without  having  once  checked, 
hounds  rolled  over  their  fox  by  themselves.  The 
second  run  lasted  for  two  hours  and  fifty  minutes ; 
hounds  were  never  once  cast,  and  they  killed  their  fox 
unaided.  In  November  1794,  but  whether  earlier  or 
later  than  the  runs  above  mentioned  is  uncertain,  a 
superlative  day's  sport  was  enjoyed  in  the  shape  of  a 
run  of  an  hour  and  fifty  minutes  without  a  check. 
They  found  in  Ashby  pastures,  and  after  an  hour  they 
changed  on  to  the  line  of  a  fresh  fox.      It  was  not  "an 


MR.    MEYNELL  47 

endways  run,"  as  the  account  says,  and  the  only  four 
who  really  rode  all  through  were  Messrs.  Cholmondeley, 
Forester,  Morant,  and  Sir  Harry  Featherstonhaugh. 
The  huntsman  and  three  or  four  others  who  had  "skirted 
with  judgment  "  came  up  just  after  the  fox  was  killed, 
but  the  rest  of  a  large  field  were  quite  left  behind. 

When  Mr.  Meynell  first  hunted  the  Ouorn  country 
he  had  but  two  subscribers,  Lord  R.  Cavendish  and  Mr. 
Boothby,  to  help  him  ;  but  as  time  rolled  on  subscrip- 
tions were  asked  for  and  were  obtained.  In  Mr.  Mey- 
nell's  early  days,  however,  fox-hunters  would  appear  to 
have  been  a  power  in  the  land,  for  when  Dr.  Ford,  vicar 
of  Melton  (author  of  "The  Melton  Hunt  in  1813,"  see 
pp.  96  and  97),  was  preaching  a  charity  sermon,  several 
well-known  hunting  men  came  late  into  church,  where- 
upon the  learned  doctor1  paused  to  say,  "Here  the 
red-coats  come,  they  know  their  Christian  duties  ;  there 
is  not  a  man  among  them  but  what  is  good  for  a  guinea." 

In  his  own  mode  of  managing  a  subscription  pack, 
Mr.  Meynell  was  from  all  accounts  one  by  himself.  A 
chronicler  of  the  time  says  of  him,  "  He  had  to  humour 
as  well  as  to  contend  with  a  race  of  as  dashing  young- 
men  in  Harvey  Aston,  Charles  Wyndham,  &c,  as  could 
be  found,  who  were  continually  racing  against  each  other 
and  before  his  hounds  ;  but  by  the  force  of  his  laughter 
and  the  pleasantry  of  his  observations  upon  them  they 
were  called  to  order  and  acknowledged  their  error." 
On  two  of  his  field  one  day  riding  in  front  of  his  hounds, 
he  made  the  remark  that  his  hounds  were  following-  the 
gentlemen  who  had  kindly  gone  forward  to  see  what  the 
fox  was  about.  Indeed,  the  Quorn  field  appears  at  times 
to  have  been  extremely  unruly,  for  on  one  occasion,  when 
one  of  the  greatest  thrusters  of  the  hunt  was  asked 
whether  he  had  taken  the  head  in  a  certain  run,  he  calmly 
replied,  "No,  I  was  only  second;  but  I  was  a  field  and 

1  ATotes  and  Queries,  vol.  ii.  p.  252. 


48  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

a  half  in  front  of  the  hounds."  According  to  all  accounts 
Mr.  Childe,  of  Kinlet,  first  set  the  example  of  hard 
riding  in  Leicestershire,1  one  of  his  favourite  mounts 
being  either  a  pure  or  half-bred  arab  ;  and  Mr.  Meynell 
declared  that  after  Cecil  Forester  and  Lord  Jersey 
followed  Mr.  Childe's  example  of  going  at  a  "  splitter- 
cockation  pace  "  he  never  had  a  moment's  peace.  When 
describing-  what  went  on  in  the  hunting-field  he  used  to 
say,  "  First  out  of  covert  comes  Cecil  Forester,  then 
the  fox,  and  lastly  my  hounds."  Mr.  Meynell's  fol- 
lowers, too,  appear  to  have  gone  the  pace,  for  a  writer 
of  the  last  century  (1797)  declared  that  the  Quorndon 
Hunt  with  its  mad  collaterals  had  ruined  a  great  many, 
and  by  the  general  extravagance  had  nearly  compassed 
its  own  destruction. 

To  hark  back  for  a  moment  to  Quorndon  Hall,  there 
are  two  old  books,  "  Sketch  of  a  Tourist  into  Derbyshire 
and  Yorkshire,"  by  William  Bray,  published  in  1783, 
and  "  Select  Views  in  Leicestershire,"  by  J.  Throsby 
(1789).  Both  these  publications  state  in  effect  that  Mr. 
Meynell,  at  one  period,  turned  Quorndon  Hall  into  a 
sort  of  private  hotel.     Mr.  Bray  says  : — 

The  hounds  are  kept  by  subscription  ;  but  that  gentleman 
(Mr.  Meynell)  permits  his  servant  to  accommodate  as  many  of 
his  friends  as  his  house  will  hold  with  apartments,  where  they  are 
furnished  with  dinner  and  all  provisions  as  at  any  public  place. 
Many  of  those  who  attend  the  hunt  and  cannot  get  apartments  in 
the  house,  and  ai-e  strangers,  come  to  the  inns,  and  a  great  many 
hunters  are  kept  here.  The  company  on  a  field  day  is  very 
numerous,  and  they  go  out  with  as  much  ceremony  as  to  court, 
their  hair  being  always  dressed. 


1  Mr.  Childe  may  have  introduced  hard  riding  into  Leicestershire  ;  but 
long  before  Mr.  Meynell  had  the  Quorn  country  people  rode  hard  else- 
where, as  we  have  an  account  of  the  Duke  of  Devonshire  riding  down 
Leven  Down,  in  Sussex,  with  the  Charlton  Hunt,  and  leaping  a  five-barred 
eate  when  he  reached  the  foot  of  the  hill. 


MR.    MEYNELL  49 

The  meaning  of  the  passage  concerning  the  apart- 
ments, dinner,  and  other  provisions  is  somewhat  obscure, 
but  it  surely  cannot  mean  that  the  master  of  the  Quorn 
took  any  payment ;  while,  although  Mr.  Meynell  was  a 
tolerably  wealthy  man,  his  purse  could  hardly  have  stood 
the  strain  of  keeping  absolutely  open  house  for  nearly 
half  a  century  at  a  stretch  ! 

In  the  matter  of  hound-breeding,  Mr.  Meynell's  idea 
as  to  a  hound's  shape  did  not  materially  differ  from  those 
of  the  Peterborough  judges.  Straight  legs,  good  bone, 
and  compact  feet  he  set  great  store  by,  and  what  more 
can  modern  masters  want,  especially  as  the  great  master 
of  the  last  century  insisted  upon  good  backs  and 
shoulders ;  but  he  was  equally  exacting  with  respect 
to  nose  and  stamina.  Mr.  Meynell  had  a  famous  old 
hound,  Rattler  by  name,  and  when  he  was  past  work 
he  had  the  run  of  the  place  ;  but  the  kitchen  and  the 
servants'  hall  were  his  favourite  resorts.  Rattler  used  to 
play  about  with  several  dogs  in  a  field  near  the  house  ; 
but  no  sooner  did  the  bell  ring  for  the  servants'  dinner 
than  he  immediately  left  his  companions  and  bolted  off 
for  the  servants'  hall. 

What  we  should  now  consider  eccentricities  were 
indulged  in  by  Mr.  Meynell.  For  example,  he  entered 
his  hounds  at  hare,  and  if  the  hounds  had  to  be  cast  in 
the  field  after  the  huntsman  had  had  one  try,  it  was  in 
three  lots  in  different  directions,  the  master  taking  one 
batch  himself,  the  huntsman  a  second,  and  the  whipper- 
in  a  third.  Still,  whatever  we  may  think  of  these  matters, 
the  pack  showed  such  excellent  sport  that  many  notabili- 
ties were  attracted  to  Leicestershire,  and  many  hunters 
were  stabled  in  various  parts  of  the  county.  In  1795,  for 
instance,  Major-General  St.  Leger  kept  ten  horses  to 
hunt  with  Mr.  Meynell,  and  Sir  Henry  Featherston- 
haugh  "daily  aired  thirty  hunters  in  body  clothing." 

As  a  horseman   Mr.   Meynell  appears  to  have  been 

D 


5o  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

amongst  the  best  of  his  time  ;  he  mounted  himself  and 
his  man  in  the  first  style,  and  hunters  were  by  no  means 
cheap  even  then,  for  we  read  of  a  farmer  selling  one  for 
four  hundred  guineas  !    The  author  of  a  by  no  means  bad 
account  of  "  A  Day  with  Old  Meynell  "  relates  how,  after 
hounds  had  been  running  for  three-quarters  of  an  hour, 
all  those  of  the  field  who  were  up  with  the  pack  were  led 
by  a  pilot  to  a  certain  gateway  by  which  alone  exit  from 
that  particular  enclosure  was  to  be  obtained.      Imagine 
their  disgust  on  discovering  that  the  gate  having  been 
broken  down,  probably  in  the  course  of  some  other  run, 
its  place  was  supplied  by  a  set  of  stout  oak  rails  of  the 
noli  me  tangere  stamp.     The  field  was  looking  out  for 
Shufflers   Bottom,   when   up   came   Mr.   Meynell  on   his 
favourite  grey,  well  cleared  the  forbidding  rails  in   his 
stride,  and  left  his  field  in  the  lurch.      "Nimrod,"  too, 
gives  the  old  Squire  a  testimonial  for  his  riding  abilities, 
for  when  he  was  out  with  the  Ouorn  during  the  time  that 
Lord  Sefton  had  the  hounds,  he  says  that  Mr.  Meynell 
rode  a  burst  of  half-an-hour  in  grand  style,  and  with  all 
the  enjoyment  of  a  young  man.     Yet  this  was  when  Mr. 
Meynell  was  getting  on  for  seventy  years  of  age  ;  but, 
added  Mr.  Apperley,  "he  was  always  a  hard  rider."     In 
the  time  of  Mr.  Boothby  and  Mr.  Meynell,  however,  and 
for  a  good  many  years  after  that,  Leicestershire  was  not 
the  difficult  country  to  cross  it  now  is  ;  for  there  were  far 
fewer  fences.     An  old  sportsman  has  left  it  on  record  that 
in  Mr.  Meynell's  earlier  days  a  great  deal  of  Leicester- 
shire was  so  deep  as  almost  to  deserve  the  appellation 
"  boggy  "  ;  but  it  carried  a  good  scent,  and  a  horse  which 
could  stand  up  for  twenty  minutes  when  hounds  really 
ran   was   held   to   have   distinguished   himself.       Before, 
however,   Mr.   Meynell   bade  the  world  adieu,  draining 
had  begun  to  improve  the  country  from  a  riding  point  of 
view.     According  to  "  Nimrod,"  Lord  Forester  used  to 
declare  that  there  was  a  time  when  he  could  sit  on  his 


MR.    MEYNELL  51 

horse  at  Melton  spinney,  cast  his  eyes  around  him  from 
that  commanding  spot,  and  fail  to  discern  a  single  ploughed 
field.  The  Meltonian  of  to-day,  however,  may  be  some- 
what surprised  at  reading,  on  the  strength  of  the  same 
authority — 

The  War  prices,  however — wheat  at  a  guinea  a  bushel,  and 
other  grain  in  proportion — altered  the  face  of  Leicestershire.  A 
considerable  part  of  the  fine  old  green  sward  was  turned  up,  and 
even  now  (1835)  much  of  it  remains  under  plough. 

Who  Mr.  Meynell's  first  huntsman  was  we  have 
no  means  of  knowing,  but  the  first  of  whom  we  hear 
anything  is  John  Raven,  who  possibly  went  to  Mr. 
Meynell  in  1775,  as  in  the  Leicester  J otirnal  for  the 
4th  of  November  1775  appears  an  advertisement  to  the 
effect  that  a  huntsman  was  required  for  the  Leicester- 
shire hounds  :  applicants  were  to  apply  to  the  printer 
of  the  paper.  John  Raven  is  reputed  to  have  been  a 
man  whose  power  over  hounds  was  something  remark- 
able ;  but  some  of  these  old  stories  must  be  accepted 
with  caution.  It  is  stated,  for  instance,  that  on  one 
occasion  Mr.  Meynell's  hounds  ran  a  fox  into  a  rather 
small  gorse,  in  which  there  was  a  danger  of  his  being 
chopped.  Thereupon  the  pack  were  stopped  with  a 
wave  of  the  hand,  and  drawn  out  of  covert.  A  couple 
of  old  hounds  were  then  set  to  play  the  part  of  tufters, 
and  the  fox  was  eventually  forced  to  take  to  the  open  ; 
but  although  the  pack  saw  him  go  away,  not  a  single 
hound  stirred  until  the  signal  was  given,  when  they  at 
once  hit  off  the  line  and  eventually  killed  their  fox. 
Early  in  this  chapter  mention  was  made  of  Joseph 
Jones  (the  author  of  the  Diary),  Mr.  Meynell's  whipper- 
in.  This  worthy  appears  to  have  been  something  after 
the  stamp  of  Tom  Moody,  and  it  is  related  that  in  the 
mornings  following  his  festive  nights  there  used  to  be 


52  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

great  searches  after  his  cork  leg,  which  he  used  to  take 
off  at  odd  times  and  leave  anywhere. 

Although  Mr.  Meynell  bought  Ouorndon  very  soon 
after  he  took  the  hounds,  he  seems  to  have  hunted  from 
Langton  Hall  for  a  portion  of  each  season,  for  there  are 
several  notifications  to  the  effect  that  the  pack  would 
not  leave  until  a  certain  date;  in  1786  hounds  did  not 
start  for  Quorn  until  the  middle  of  November. 

Mr.  Meynell's  popularity  was  very  great,  yet  some 
extraordinary  rumours  were  abroad  at  times.  Once  it 
was  reported  that  Mr.  Meynell,  his  hounds,  and  his 
followers  were  about  to  desert  Leicestershire  altogether. 
That  was  in  1778,  and  then  the  Leicester  Journal 
was  authorised  to  state  that  such  was  not  the  case  ; 
but  the  hounds  would  be  in  Leicestershire  during  the 
months  of  October,  November,  December,  and  January 
in  every  year,  though  where  they  cub-hunted  in  Sep- 
tember, and  hunted  after  January,  is  not  stated.  Then 
another  story  was  that  the  Hunt  was  to  be  discontinued 
after  the  season  1787-88,  in  consequence  of  the  subscrip- 
tion thereto  expiring,  and  that  a  few  coverts  only  would 
be  kept  for  Mr.  Meynell,  junior.  This  rumour  was 
promptly  contradicted  ;  but  it  was  admitted  that  the  tide 
of  fashion  had  turned  towards  Belvoir,  and  that  many 
of  those  who  had  previously  followed  "the  Primate  of 
the  Science  "  had  determined  to  throw  in  their  lot  with 
Sir  Carnaby  Haggerstone,  who  was  then  carrying  on 
the  Hunt. 

It  is  not  generally  known  that  Mr.  Meynell  inte- 
rested himself  greatly  in  the  subject  of  rabies  in  dogs  and 
hounds,  and  communicated  to  a  physician  the  result  of 
his  experience,  and  it  is  worthy  of  note  that  Mr.  Meynell 
declared  that  rabies  could  not  be  given  by  one  dog  to 
another  otherwise  than  by  a  bite.  This  truism  is  only 
mentioned  by  way  of  showing  that  Mr.  Meynell  knew 
quite  well  what  he  was  talking  about,  as  since  his  time 


MR.    MEYNELL  s3 

many  persons  have  believed  that  dogs  can  become  mad 
— just  as  a  human  being  may  contract  a  cold — without 
any  reasonable  cause  or  explanation.  The  whole  docu- 
ment, though  some  of  it  may  possibly  be  out  of  date 
now,  shows  that  Mr.  Meynell  had  thoroughly  studied  his 
subject,  and  was  a  man  of  keen  observation  in  kennel. 

Mr.  Thursby,  the  writer  of  "  Excursions  into  Leices- 
tershire," after  remarking  that  Ouorndon  Hall  had  been 
the  occasional  residence  of  princes  of  the  blood  royal  of 
France  and  of  many  of  the  first  nobility  in  England, 
from  which  we  may  assume  that  they  were  Mr.  Meynell's 
guests,  relates  that  in  1786  the  Duke  of  York  accom- 
panied the  Ouorn  hounds  to  Thorpe  Langton,  where 
they  found  a  fox,  which  they  lost  after  running  him 
through  Welham,  Slawson,  Stokerston,  and  Beaumont 
Chase.  There  was  of  course  an  enormous  concourse 
of  spectators  to  see  the  duke,  whose  affability  greatly 
pleased  the  multitude.  On  a  subsequent  occasion  the 
Prince  of  Wales's  horses  were  sent  to  Market  Har- 
borough,  as  he  intended  hunting  with  Mr.  Meynell,  but 
other  business  detaining  him,  he  was  unable  to  go  to 
Leicestershire,  to  the  disappointment  of  the  county  at 
large. 

This,  however,  was  not  the  first  occasion  on  which 
Royalty  hunted  with  Mr.  Meynell.  One  Sunday  night, 
about  Christmas-time,  1  766,  the  Duke  of  York  sent  an 
express  to  Mr.  Cradock  to  tell  him  that  he  intended 
hunting  next  day  in  the  neighbourhood  of  Gumley — 
presumably  Mr.  Meynell  had  announced  his  intention 
of  meeting  in  that  district.  Accordingly,  the  Duke 
appeared  at  the  covert  side  on  the  Monday,  and  seems 
to  have  enjoyed  himself. 

It  has  been  already  mentioned  that  when  Meynell 
first  began  to  hunt  the  Ouorn  country  he  had  but  two 
subscribers,  but  in  1783  it  is  said  he  had  five  suppor- 
ters who  contributed  a  thousand  guineas  each  ;  but  the 


54  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

names  of  four  only  are  mentioned — the  Duke  of  Bed- 
ford, Sir  Harry  Featherstonhaugh,  Lord  Maynard,  and 
Lord  Robert  Spencer.  This  statement,  one  would 
imagine,  must  be  received  with  some  caution,  for,  con- 
sidering that  upwards  of  four  hundred  horses  were,  it  is 
said,  brought  into  the  neighbourhood  to  hunt  with  Mr. 
Meynell,  it  seems  rather  strange  that  five  men  should 
be  willing  to  provide  sport  for  so  many  :  moreover,  if 
five  thousand  guineas  were  forthcoming  from  five  men, 
Mr.  Meynell's  contribution — no  small  one — must  be 
added,  the  total  making  a  sum  out  of  all  proportion  to 
the  requirements  of  the  day,  even  if  we  admit  that  "  the 
establishment  of  this  hunt  is  upon  an  infinitely  larger 
scale,  and  a  much  more  expensive  footing,  than  any 
other  in  this  country." 

In  this  same  year  (1783)  the  Prince  of  Wales  de- 
clared his  intention  of  hunting  with  Mr.  Meynell,  but 
he  does  not  appear  to  have  carried  out  his  intention. 
Three  years  later  he  declared  he  would  go  to  Leicester- 
shire as  soon  as  the  frost  broke,  and  his  horses  set 
out  on  their  journey  to  Leicestershire,  but  the  frost 
coming  on  again  they  returned  to  Windsor. 

By  the  time  that  the  Duke  of  York  paid  his  last  visit 
to  Leicestershire  Mr.  Meynell  was  near  the  end  of  his 
tether,  and  about  1797  or  1798,  he,  though  retaining 
the  position  of  master,  entrusted  to  his  son  the  actual 
management  of  the  pack  in  the  field.  Still,  it  was  while 
Mr.  Meynell  was  nominally  master  of  the  Quorn  that 
the  famous  Billesdon  Coplow  run  took  place,  on  Mon- 
day the  24th  February  1800,  and  this  famous  gallop  has 
been  lauded  in  verse  by  the  Rev.  Mr.  Lowth,  the  son  of 
Bishop  Lowth,  and  by  many  writers  in  prose.  No  com- 
plete version,  however,  of  Mr.  Lowth's  poem  has  ever 
been  published,  as  the  author  thought  that  in  its  original 
form  it  would  be  too  long. 

The  story  of  the  description  of  the  Billesdon  Coplow 


MR.    MEYNELL  55 

run  is  as  follows  :  Mr.  Lowth  being-  on  a  visit  to  a 
friend  living  near  Melton,  was  offered  by  his  host  a 
mount  on  a  young  thoroughbred  horse  which,  so  far  as 
the  owner  knew,  had  never  seen  hounds.  Mr.  Lowth 
rode  the  horse  to  the  place  of  meeting,  but  had  no  idea 
of  riding  him  through  a  run.  On  the  day  after  this 
famous  hunt  some  one  suggested  at  dinner  that  the  run 
was  worthy  of  being  commemorated  in  verse,  and  as  Mr. 
Lowth  was  known  to  wield  a  ready  pen,  he  was  asked  to 
give  his  own  ideas  of  the  gallop.  Mr.  Lowth,  who  was  a 
stranger  to  Leicestershire  (he  lived  in  the  H.  H.  country), 
had  of  course  no  prejudice  to  affect  him.  He  went  to 
his  room  with  his  head  full  of  the  stories  he  had  heard  ; 
he  sat  down,  and,  before  he  turned  in,  had  turned  out  a 
poem  which  has  remained  famous  from  that  day  to  this. 

I  give  here  the  usual  version,  to  which  are  appended 
the  extra  stanzas,  a  few  lines  in  the  usual  edition  being 
given  to  show  where  the  excised  lines  come  in  : — 

POEM    ON    THE    FAMOUS    BILLESDEN 
COPLOW    RUN 

Quaque  ipse  miserrima  vidi, 
Et  quorum  pars  magna  fut. 

With  the  wind  at  north-east,  forbiddingly  keen, 
The  Coplow  of  Billesden  ne'er  witnessed,  I  ween, 
Two  hundred  such  horses  and  men  at  a  burst, 
All  determined  to  ride — each  resolved  to  be  first. 
But  to  get  a  good  start  over-eager  and  jealous, 
Two-thirds,  at  the  least,  of  these  very  fine  fellows 
So  crowded,  and  hustled,  and  jostled,  and  crossed, 
That  they  rode  the  wrong  way,  and  at  starting  were  lost. 
In  spite  of  th'  unpromising  state  of  the  weather, 
Away  broke  the  fox,  and  the  hounds  close  together. 
A  burst  up  to  Tilton  so  brilliantly  ran, 
Was  scarce  ever  seen  in  the  mem'ry  of  man. 
What  hounds  guided  scent,  or  which  led  the  way, 
Your  bard — to  their  names  quite  a  stranger — can't  say ; 
Though  their  names  had  he  known,  he's  free  to  confess, 
His  horse  could  not  show  him  at  such  a  death-pace. 


56  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

Villiers,  Cholmondeley,  and  Forester  made  such  sharp  play, 

Not  omitting  Germaine,  never  seen  till  to-day  : 

Had  you  judged  of  these  four  by  the  trim  of  their  pace, 

At  Bibury  you'd  thought  they'd  been  riding  a  race. 

But  these  hounds  with  a  scent,  how  they  dash  and  they  fling, 

To  o'er-ride  them  is  quite  the  impossible  thing ; 

Disdaining  to  hang  in  the  wood,  through  he  raced, 

And  the  open  for  Skeffington  gallantly  faced ; 

Where  headed  and  foiled,  his  first  point  he  forsook, 

And  merrily  led  them  a  dance  o'er  the  brook. 

Passed  Galby  and  Norton,  Great  Stretton  and  Small, 

Right  onward  still  sweeping  to  old  Stretton  Hall ; 

Where  two  minutes'  check  served  to  show  at  one  ken 

The  extent  of  the  havoc  'mongst  horses  and  men. 

Such  sighing,  such  sobbing,  such  trotting,  such  walking ; 

Such  reeling,  such  halting,  of  fences  such  baulking  ; 

Such  a  smoke  in  the  gaps,  such  comparing  of  notes  ; 

Such  quizzing  each  other's  daubed  breeches  and  coats  : 

Here  a  man  walked  afoot  who  his  horse  had  half  killed, 

There  you  met  with  a  steed  who  his  rider  had  spilled  : 

In  short,  such  dilemmas,  such  scrapes,  such  distress, 

One  fox  ne'er  occasioned,  the  knowing  confess. 

But,  alas  !  the  dilemmas  had  scarcely  began, 

On  for  Wigston  and  Ayleston  he  resolute  ran, 

Where  a  few  of  the  stoutest  now  slackened  and  panted, 

And  many  were  seen  irretrievably  planted. 

The  high  road  to  Leicester  the  scoundrel  then  crossed, 

As  Tell-tale1  and  Beaufremont-  found  to  their  cost ; 

And  Villiers  esteemed  it  a  serious  bore, 

That  no  longer  could  Shuttlecock 3  fly  as  before  ; 

Even  Joe  Miller's  4  spirit  of  fun  was  so  broke, 

That  he  ceased  to  consider  the  run  as  a  joke. 

Then  streaming  away,  o'er  the  river  he  splashed, — 

Germaine  close  at  hand,  off  the  bank  Melon  5  dashed. 

Why  so  stout  proved  the  Dun,  in  a  scamper  so  wild  ? 

Till  now  he  had  only  been  rode  by  a  Child.1'' 

After  him  plunged  Joe  Miller  with  Musters  so  slim, 

Who  twice  sank,  and  nearly  paid  dear  for  his  whim, 

Not  reflecting  that  all  water  Melons  must  swim. 

Well  soused  by  their  dip,  on  they  brushed  o'er  the  bottom, 

With  liquor  on  board,  enough  to  besot  'em. 


Mr.  Forester's  horse.  2  Mr.  Maddock's  horse. 

Lord  Villiers's  horse.  4  Mr.  Musters's  horse. 

Mr.  Germaine's  horse.  fi  Formerly  Mr.  Child's. 


MR.    MEYNELL  57 

But  the  villain  no  longer  at  all  at  a  loss, 

Stretched  away  like  a  d 1  for  Enderby  Gorse  : 

Where  meeting  with  many  a  brother  and  cousin, 

Who  knew  how  to  dance  a  good  hay  in  the  furzen  ; 

Jack  Raven  l  at  length  coming  up  on  a  hack, 

That  a  farmer  had  lent  him,  whipped  off  the  game  pack. 

Running  sulky,  old  Loadstone2  the  stream  would  not  swim, 

No  longer  sport  proving  a  magnet  to  him. 

Of  mistakes  and  mishaps,  and  what  each  man  befell, 

Would  the  muse  could  with  justice  poetical  tell ! 

Bob  Grosvenor  on  Plush 3 — though  determined  to  ride — 

Lost  at  first  a  good  start,  and  was  soon  set  aside ; 

Though  he  charged  hill  and  dale,  not  to  lose  this  rare  chase, 

On  velvet,  Plush  could  not  get  a  footing,  alas  ! 

To  Tilton  sailed  bravely  Sir  Wheeler  O'Cuff, 

Where  neglecting,  through  hurry,  to  keep  a  good  luff, 

To  leeward  he  drifts — how  provoking  a  case  ! 

And  was  forced,  though  reluctant,  to  give  up  the  chase. 

As  making  his  way  to  the  pack's  not  his  forte, 

Sir  Lawley,4  as  usual,  lost  half  of  the  sport. 

But  then  the  professed  philosophical  creed, 

That  "all's  for  the  best," — of  Master  Candide, 

If  not  comfort  Sir  R.,  reconcile  may  at  least ; 

For,  with  this  supposition,  his  sport  is  the  best. 

Orby  Hunter,  who  seemed  to  be  hunting  his  fate, 
Got  falls,  to  the  tune  of  not  fewer  than  eight. 
Basan's  king,5  upon  Glimpse,'1  sadly  out  of  condition, 
Pulled  up,  to  avoid  of  being  tired  the  suspicion. 
Og  did  right  so  to  yield ;  for  he  very  soon  found, 
His  worst  had  he  done,  he'd  have  scarce  glimpsed  a  hound. 
Charles  Meynell,  who  lay  very  well  with  the  hounds, 
Till  of  Stretton  he  nearly  arrived  at  the  bounds, 
Now  discovered  that  Waggoner "  rather  would  creep, 
Than  exert  his  great  prowess  in  taking  a  leap  ; 
But  when  crossing  the  turnpike,  he  read  gg?T  "  Put  on  here," 
'Twas  enough  to  make  any  one  bluster  and  swear. 
The  Waggoner  feeling  familiar  the  road, 
Was  resolved  not  to  quit  it ;  so  stock  still  he  stood. 


1  The  name  of  the  huntsman.  -  The  huntsman's  horse. 

3  Mr.  Robert  Grosvenor's  horse. 

4  Sir  Robert  Lawley,  called  Sir  Lawley  in  the  Melton  dialect. 

6  Mr.  Oglander,  familiarly  called  Og.  6  Mr.  Oglander's  horse. 

7  Mr.  C.  Meynell's  horse. 


THE    QUORN    HUNT 

Yet  prithee,  dear  Charles  !  why  rash  vows  will  you  make, 

Thy  leave  of  old  Billesden  1  to  finally  take? 

Since  from  Legg's  Hill,'2  for  instance,  or  perhaps  Melton  Spinney, 

If  they  go  a  good  pace,  you  are  beat  for  a  guinea  ! 

'Tis  money,  they  say,  makes  the  mare  to  go  kind ; 

The  proverb  has  vouched  for  this  time  out  of  mind  ; 

But  though  of  this  truth  you  admit  the  full  force, 

It  may  not  hold  so  good  of  every  horse. 

If  it  did,  Ellis  Charles  need  not  bustle  and  hug, 

By  name,  not  by  nature,  his  favourite  Slug.3 

Yet  Slug  as  he  is — the  whole  of  this  chase 

Charles  ne'er  could  have  seen,  had  he  gone  a  snail's  pace. 

Old  Gradus,4  whose  fretting  and  fuming  at  first 

Disqualify  strangely  for  such  a  tight  burst, 

Ere  to  Tilton  arrived,  ceased  to  pull  and  to  crave, 

And  though  freshis/i  at  Stretton,  he  stepped  a  pas  grave  ! 

Where,  in  turning  him  over  a  cramp  kind  of  place, 

He  overturned  George,  whom  he  threw  on  his  face ; 

And  on  foot  to  walk  home  it  had  sure  been  his  fate, 

But  that  soon  he  was  caught,  and  tied  up  to  a  gate. 

Near  Wigston  occurred  a  most  singular  joke, 
Captain  Miller  averred  that  his  leg  he  had  broke, — 
And  bemoaned,  in  most  piteous  expressions,  how  hard, 
By  so  cruel  a  fracture,  to  have  his  sport  marred. 
In  quizzing  his  friends  he  felt  little  remorse 
To  finesse  the  complete  doing  up  of  his  horse. 
Had  he  told  a  long  story  of  losing  a  shoe, 
Or  of  laming  his  horse,  he  very  well  knew 
That  the  Leicestershire  creed  out  this  truism  worms, 
"  Lost  shoes  and  dead  beat  are  synonymous  terms." 
So  a  horse  must  here  learn,  whatever  he  does, 
To  die  game — as  at  Tyburn — and  "  die  in  his  shoes." 
Bethel  Cox,  and  Tom  Smith,  Messieurs  Bennett  and  Hawke, 
Their  nags  all  contrived  to  reduce  to  a  walk. 
Maynard's  Lord,  who  detests  competition  and  strife, 
As  well  in  the  chase  as  in  social  life, 
Than  whom  nobody  harder  has  rode  in  his  time, 
But  to  crane  here  and  there  now  thinks  it  no  crime, 
That  he  beat  some  crack  riders  most  fairly  may  crow, 
For  he  lived  to  the  end,  though  he  scarcely  knows  how. 


1  He  had  threatened  never  to  follow  the  hounds  again  from  Billesden,  on 
account  of  his  weight.  2  A  different  part  of  the  hunt. 

3  Mr.  Charles  Ellis's  horse.  4  Mr.  George  Ellis's  horse. 


MR.    MEYNELL  59 

With  snaffle  and  martingale  held  in  the  rear, 
His  horse's  mouth  open  half  up  to  his  ear ; 
Mr.  Wardle,  who  threatened  great  things  overnight,1 
Beyond  Stretton  was  left  in  most  terrible  plight. 
Too  lean  to  be  pressed,  yet  egged  on  by  compulsion, 
No  wonder  his  nag  tumbled  into  convulsion. 
Ah  !  had  he  but  lost  a  fore  shoe,  or  fell  lame, 
'Twould  only  his  sport  have  curtailed,  not  his  fame. 
Loraine,2 — than  whom  no  one  his  game  plays  more  safe, 
Who  the  last  to  the  first  prefers  seeing  by  half, — 
What  with  nicking  3  and  keeping  a  constant  look-out, 
Every  turn  of  the  scent  surely  turned  to  account. 
The  wonderful  pluck  of  his  horse  surprised  some, 
But  he  knew  they  were  making  point  blank  for  his  home. 
"Short  home"  to  be  brought  we  all  should  desire, 
Could  we  manage  the  trick  like  the  Enderby  4  squire. 

Wild  Shelley,5  at  starting  all  ears  and  all  eyes, 
Who  to  get  a  good  start  all  experiment  tries, 
Yet  contrived  it  so  ill,  as  to  throw  out  poor  Gipsy,6 
Whom  he  rattled  along  as  if  he'd  been  tipsy, 
To  catch  them  again  ;  but,  though  famous  for  speed, 
She  never  could  touch 7  them,  much  less  get  a  lead, 
So  disheartened,  disjointed,  and  beat,  home  he  swings, 
Not  much  unlike  a  fiddler  hung  upon  strings. 

An  H.  H.8  who  in  Leicestershire  never  had  been, 
So  of  course  such  a  tickler  ne'er  could  have  seen, 
Just  to  see  them  throw  off,  on  a  raw  horse  was  mounted, 
Who  a  hound  had  ne'er  seen,  nor  a  fence  had  confronted. 
But  they  found  in  such  style,  and  went  off  at  such  score, 
That  he  could  not  resist  the  attempt  to  see  more  : 
So  with  scrambling,  and  dashing,  and  one  rattling  fall, 
He  saw  all  the  fun,  up  to  Stretton's  white  Hall. 
There  they  anchored,  in  plight  not  a  little  distressing — 
The  horse  being  raw,  he  of  course  got  a  dressing. 
That  wonderful  mare  of  Vanneck's,  who  till  now 
By  no  chance  ever  tired,  was  taken  in  tow : 


1  Said  to  have  threatened  that  he  would  beat  the  whole  field. 

2  Mr.  Loraine  Smith.  3  A  term  of  reproach. 
4  Where  Mr.  Loraine  Smith  lives.  5  Usually  very  grave. 

6  Sir  John  Shelley's  mare.  7  Melton  dialect  for  "overtake." 

8  These  initials  may  serve  either  for  Hampshire  hog  or  Hampshire  Hunt. 


60  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

And  what's  worse,  she  gave  Van  such  a  devilish  jog 

In  the  face  with  her  head,  plunging  out  of  a  bog, 

That  with  eye  black  as  ink,  or  as  Edward's  famed  Prince, 

Half  blind  has  he  been,  and  quite  deaf  ever  since. 

But  let  that  not  mortify  thee,  Shacabac  ; 1 

She  only  was  blown,  and  came  home  a  rare  hack. 

There  Craven  too  stopped,  whose  misfortune,  not  fault, 
His  mare  unaccountably  vexed  with  string-halt ; 
And  when  she  had  ceased  thus  spasmodic  to  prance, 
Her  mouth  'gan  to  twitch  with  St.  Vitus's  dance. 
But  how  shall  described  be  the  fate  of  Rose  Price, 
Whose  fav'rite  white  gelding  conveyed  him  so  nice 
Through  thick  and  through  thin,  that  he  vowed  and  protested 2 
No  money  should  part  them,  as  long  as  life  lasted  ? 
But  the  pace  that  effected  which  money  could  not : 
For  to  part,  and  in  death,  was  their  no  distant  lot. 
In  a  fatal  blind  ditch  Carlo  Khan's  3  powers  failed, 
Where  nor  lancet  nor  laudanum  either  availed. 
More  care  of  a  horse  than  he  took,  could  take  no  man  ; 
He'd  more  straw  than  would  serve  any  lying-in  woman. 
Still  he  died  ! — yet  just  how,  as  nobody  knows, 
It  may  truly  be  said,  he  died  "under  the  Rose." 
At  the  death  of  poor  Khan,  Melton  feels  such  remorse, 
That  they've  christened  that  ditch,  "The  Vale  of  White  Horse." 

Thus  ended  a  chase,  which  for  distance  and  speed 
Its  fellow  we  never  have  heard  of  or  read. 
Every  species  of  ground  ev'ry  horse  does  not  suit, 
What's  a  good  country  hunter  may  here  prove  a  brute ; 
And,  unless  for  all  sorts  of  strange  fences  prepared, 
A  man  and  his  horse  are  sure  to  be  scared. 
This  variety  gives  constant  life  to  the  chase ; 
But  as  Forester  says — "  Sir,  what  kills,  is  the  pace." 
In  most  other  countries  they  boast  of  their  breed, 
For  carrying,  at  times,  such  a  beautiful  head ; 
But  these  hounds  to  carry  a  head  cannot  fail, 
And  constantly  too,  for, — by  George, — there's  no  tail. 
Talk  of  horses,  and  hounds,  and  the  system  of  kennel, 
Give  me  Leicestershire  nags,  and  the  hounds  of  Old  Meynell ! 


1  A  name  taken  from  Blue  Beard,  and  given  to  Mr.  Vanneck  by  his 
Melton  friends. 

2  At  the  covert  side  a  large  sum  was  offered  for  it. 

3  Mr.  Price's  horse. 


MR.    MEYNELL  61 


Extra  Stanzas 

But  these  hounds  with  a  scent,  how  they  dash  and  they  fling ; 

To  o'er-ride  them  is  quite  the  impossible  thing. 

At  starting,  descending  that  desperate  vale, 

'Stead  of  skirting  the  hill,  to  fall  could  not  fail. 

E'en  regaining  with  Loadstone  and  Raven  that  hill, 

Was  enough  many  country  good  horses  to  kill. 

Arrived  at  the  top,  and  fast  gulping  for  breath 

To  avoid  the  mad  staggers,  or  perhaps  sudden  death, 

To  fall  in  with  the  hill  nags  when  we  could  scarce  creep, 

As  they  poured  from  around  the  amphitheatre's  sweep, 

Slap-dash,  seeming  cloud-dropped,  at  three  quarters  speed, 

None  of  us  could  then  compass  e'en  those  thoroughbred ; 

Or  from  stage  scenes  behind,  being  all  in  the  secret, 

By  the  trap-door  from  Coplow  to  Tilton  to  migrate. 

A  rencounter  so  sudden,  it  put  me  in  mind 

Of  a  flight  of  young  pigeons,  when  right  'fore  the  wind, 

Or  the  whiz  of  an  arrow  shot  out  of  a  bow  ; 

Now  by  them  and  their  pace  to  be  taken  in  tow 

Were  enough  to  have  shook  stouter  nerves  than  were  mine, 

And  disordered  for  ever  the  stout  Palatine.1 

While  we  sloped  and  were  ploughing  much  deeper  than  hoof 

On  the  hill  every  Pegasus  kept  them  aloof; 

Had  they  all  been  with  us  in  the  valley  beneath 

They  avoided  so  wise  as  the  valley  of  death — 

With  the  hounds  their  ascension,  I  shrewdly  suspect 

Would  have  proved  most  remarkably  choice  and  select ; 

If  many,  indeed,  perhaps  famed  on  the  flat 

Had  not  ended  their  sport  there,  or  haply  though  late, 

They  had  managed  to  reach  the  steep  height,  their  dim  eye 

Might  have  viewed,  not  the  hounds,  but  their  fate  only  nigh. 

A  few  there  were  who  had  ridden  the  line  yard  for 
yard  with  the  hounds,  and  when  they  reached  Tilton 
with  their  horses  in  a  lather  and  pretty  well  blown, 
they  must  have  been  rather  angry  at  finding  so  many 
of  the  field  cantering  up  with  their  horses  not  at  all 
distressed,  since  they  had  come  by  the  road.  At  tin's 
stage,  however,  the  victory  of  the  point  rider  and  skirter 

1  The  horse  on  which  Mr.  Lowth  was  mounted. 


62  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

would  appear  to  have  come  to  an  end,  for  the  fox,  in- 
stead of  making  what  was  supposed  to  be  his  original 
point — over  Tilton  Hill — was  headed  and  turned  short  to 
the  right,  facing  the  open  country  towards  Skeffington. 
At  this  point  both  thrusters  and  skirters  were  together, 
and  the  struggle  for  supremacy  began.  The  line  lay 
over  a  splendid  line,  for  Mr.  Lowth  in  one  of  his  un- 
published notes  says — 

But  one  field  we  rode  that  was  not  laid  in  grass.  The  fox, 
on  leaving  Skeffington,  took  a  line  bearing  still  more  to  the  right 
by  Gadby,  but,  unwilling  to  face  the  wind,  gave  up  his  original 
point  and  turned  south,  and  then  going  west,  ran  down  wind  to 
Enderby. 

In  this  part  of  the  run  it  was  that   Mr.  Lowth  de- 
scribed in  the  original  MS.  his  "one  rattling  fall"  : — 

As  the  pace,  now  old  Marplot  or  Magic  maintain, 

So  now  Villiers,  now  Forester,  Cholmondeley,  Germaine, 

Take  the  lead  in  their  turn  'mong  the  Nimrods,  as  each 

By  speed,  by  quick  eye,  and  by  nerve  the  pack  reach. 

On  these  guides  any  stranger  may  safely  depend 

If  he's  duly  prepared  to  meet  his  last  end. 

Not  on  things  on  the  earth  is  concentred  their  love, 

Their  affections  are  set  upon  things  far  above. 

Even  Herschel  himself,  with  much  wonder  would  stare 

To  see  these  bright  meteors  skim  through  the  air, 

So  Villiers,  who  during  the  speediest  course, 

Ever  picks  with  decision  choice  ground  for  his  horse ; 

A  stranger,  who  marked  how  direct  was  his  line 

To  him  straight  determined  his  faith  to  confine  ; 

But  scarce  had  resolved  on  this  laudable  plan 

Ere  the  musical  pack  with  such  eagerness  ran 

Down  a  seeming  small  gulley,  which  spreading,  was  seen 

To  become  a  wide  track  two  steep  hills  between. 

About  midway  this  chine,  as  the  fleet  pack  divide, 

We  hoped  that  the  scent  would  have  lain  on  our  side, 

When,  as  ill-luck  would  have  it  (could  fortune  do  worse  ?) 

The  scent  soon  turned  out  to  be  just  the  reverse. 

My  guide  thus  thrown  out,  down  the  precipice  swept, 

Charged  the  rail  and  the  brook,  through  the  sedge  as  it  crept. 


MR.    MEYNELL  63 

Close  behind  poor  Pilgarlic '  in  charging  the  same 
Cleared  the  rail  and  the  gulf,  but  alas  !  headlong  came 
Horse  and  all,  for  the  novice  unpractised  to  land, 
From  want  of  Exertion,  was  sadly  trepanned ; 
Though  to  make  as  amends  for  this  trifling  faux  pas 
(A  completer  capsize  no  man  living  e'er  saw) 
On  the  brow  of  the  hill,  where  the  grass  lay  but  thin, 
A  most  opportune  half- minute's  check  let  us  in. 
Let  that  poet  be  therefore  no  longer  believed 
Who  averred  that  "one  false  step  can  ne'er  be  retrieved." 
Yet,  had  he  been  pressed,2  perhaps  again  he'd  have  come, 
Since  he  gallantly  faced  two-and-twenty  miles  home. 
How  he  met  with  fair  play,  there's  no  reason  to  doubt. 
But  the  whole  of  this  trimmer  he'd  fairly  seen  out  ; 
For  to  covert  being  fanned,  as  a  hackney  apace, 
He  directly  supplied,  too,  a  hunter's  hard  place. 

This  horse  Palatine  must  have  been  an  exceedingly 
good  one  ;  but  though  raw  and  unfit,  as  was  supposed,  he 
must  have  been  kept  in  some  condition  by  being  hacked 
about.  Blood  will  tell,  they  say,  and  it  was  so  in  this 
case  ;  moreover,  he  was  ridden  by  a  superlative  feather- 
weight horseman. 

About  a  couple  of  hundred  started  from  the  Coplow, 
on  their  second  horses,  of  course,  for  the  first  horses 
had  been  sent  home  before  the  Coplow  fox  was  found 
at  two  o'clock.  This  fox  ran  about  twenty-eight  miles, 
and  eventually  beat  both  hounds  and  horses. 

On  giving  up  actual  management  of  the  hounds  Mr. 
Meynell  built  himself  a  cottage  near  the  kennels,  with  a 
passage  running  into  them  from  his  house  ;  and  in  1800 
he  sold  his  hounds  and  Quorndon  Hall  to  Lord  Sefton, 
who  succeeded  him,  and  for  five  years  maintained  the 
Quorn  hounds  in  princely  fashion.  Mr.  Meynell  con- 
tinued to  go  out  with  Lord  Sefton,  as  mentioned  by 
"  Nimrod,"  and  after  he  had  parted  with  his  hounds  it 
was  found  that  his  correctness  of  ear  was  by  no  means 
impaired  by  his  advancing  years.     While  a  small  covert 

1  The  author.  -  The  author's  horse, 


64  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

was  being  drawn  a  hound  spoke,  and  Lord  Sefton, 
riding  up  to  Mr.  Meynell,  asked  him  what  hound  had 
spoken.  "  I  think  it  was  Concord,"  replied  the  old 
master.  "  No,"  objected  Lord  Sefton,  "Concord  was  at 
my  heels  all  the  time."  "  I  am  pretty  sure  that  it  was 
either  Concord  or  Caroline  "  (brother  and  sister),  rejoined 
Mr.  Meynell. 

Soon  afterwards  Jack  Raven,  the  huntsman,  came 
cantering  by  with  the  main  body  of  the  pack.  "  What 
hound  was  that  which  spoke  ? "  asked  Lord  Sefton. 
"Concord,  my  Lord,"  was  the  answer,  and  so  the  point 
was  settled. 

During  the  middle  and  later  years  of  Mr.  Meynell's 
mastership  there  often  appeared  in  the  field  Mr.  (after- 
wards Captain)  Charles  Combers,  who  was  born  at  Brent- 
wood somewhere  about  the  year  1752.  He  was  entered 
to  hounds  when  only  about  nine  years  of  age,  and  when 
he  reached  man's  estate  was  known  as  "  The  Flying 
Cucumber,"  from  the  manner  in  which  he  put  his  horses 
along.  After  leaving  the  university  (Oxford,  I  think) 
he  joined  the  nth  Dragoons;  ran  through  his  money, 
and  was  ultimately  appointed  captain  commandant  of 
an  advance  corps  in  Ireland  about  1796. 

When  "The  Flying  Cucumber"  was  in  full  feather 
he  gravitated  towards  Leicestershire,  taking  with  him 
two  good  hunters  and  a  hack — not  much  of  a  stud  as  we 
should  think  now — -having  about  a  hundred  pounds  in 
his  pocket.  On  the  very  first  day  he  met  the  hounds 
he  went  as  straight  as  a  dart,  and  among  those  whom 
he  pounded  was  Lord  Maynard,  who,  addressing  him, 
said,  "  Combers,  1  should  like  to  buy  your  nag  ;  I  gave 
^"300  for  mine,  but  yours  is  a  better  jumper."  The 
bargain  was  eventually  closed  by  Lord  Maynard  giving 
his  horse  and  £50  in  exchange  for  Combers's  hunter, 
and  a  few  days  later  Comber  rode  the  new  horse  field 
for  field  with  the  hounds.     The  experience  of  this  run 


MR.    MEYNELL  65 

served  to  show  Lord  Maynard  that,  after  all,  his  original 
three  hundred  guinea  horse  was  the  better  of  the  two,  and 
eventually  the  horses  were  exchanged  again,  Combers 
drawing  another  ^50.  It  would  appear  that  in  the 
course  of  the  season  he  had  several  more  remunerative 
sales  and  barters,  and  when  he  left  Leicestershire  it 
was  with  ^800  in  his  pocket. 

Harvey's  Sauce  is  a  very  well  known  condiment  to- 
day, and  it  is  to  "The  Flying  Cucumber"  that  we  owe 
it.  On  one  occasion  when  on  his  way  to  Leicestershire 
he  stopped,  as  was  his  wont,  at  Bedford  to  dine  at  the 
George,  then  kept  by  a  man  named  Harvey,  where  he 
ordered  a  steak,  and  when  it  was  served,  Combers  re- 
quested Harvey  to  let  his  servant  bring  from  his  buggy  a 
quart  bottle  which  contained  an  admirable  sauce.  Having 
poured  some  of  it  into  his  plate  and  mixed  it  with  the 
gravy  of  the  steak,  he  asked  Harvey  to  taste  it,  and 
the  host  pronounced  it  to  be  a  most  excellent  relish. 
"Well,  Mr.  Harvey,"  said  Combers,  "I  shall  leave  the 
bottle  with  you,  to  use  till  my  return,  only  be  careful  to 
reserve  enough  for  me."  On  the  next  day  Harvey  had 
to  provide  a  wedding  dinner,  and  introduced  the  sauce, 
which  afforded  such  general  satisfaction  that  several 
smaller  parties  were  made  up,  and  the  contents  of  the 
bottle  were  soon  exhausted. 

In  due  course  Captain  Combers  returned,  and  having 
been  told  that  no  more  sauce  remained,  said,  "  Never 
mind,  I  can  make  some  more  from  my  mother's  recipe  ; 
and,  by-the-bye,  I  will  give  you  a  copy  of  it."  He  was  as 
good  as  his  word.  Harvey  made  it  in  large  quantities  ; 
sent  it  to  the  different  shops  in  London  ;  advertised  it 
as  "  Harvey's  Sauce,"  and  by  its  extensive  sale  realised 
a  large  income.  He  subsequently  sold  the  recipe  for  an 
annuity  of  ^400  or  ^500  a  year,  which  he  received  for 
the  remainder  of  his  life.     Such  at  least  is  the  story. 

Mr.  Meynell,  while  popular  with  his  subscribers,  was 


66  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

held  in  high  esteem  by  the  farmers  and  cattle-dealers, 
whose  interests  he  ever  consulted.  Punctuality  at  the 
covert  side  was  not  the  least  of  his  virtues,  but  on  one 
occasion  seeing  a  horse  ridden  by  a  lad,  and  knowing 
who  the  owner  was,  he  pulled  out  his  watch  at  the  time 
when  the  hounds  should  have  moved  off,  and  said,  "  I 
see  Jack  So-and-so's  horse  here,  and  he  has  not  come. 
It  is  Leicester  Fair  this  morning  ;  he  is  a  good  fellow, 
and  we  will  give  him  a  quarter  of  an  hour's  law !  "  The 
Jack  in  question  was  a  sporting  grazier  who  was  attend- 
ing the  fair  on  business,  but  the  cattle-market  was  held 
early  in  the  morning,  and  many  a  sporting  farmer,  who 
could  afford  to  keep  a  hunter  in  those  days,  did  his  busi- 
ness first  and  then  came  on  to  hunt  afterwards.  "  Few 
masters  of  hounds,"  wrote  a  chronicler  of  the  time, 
"bear  this  in  mind:  this  is  the  way  to  preserve  a 
country." 

Towards  the  close  of  Mr.  Meynell's  career  Messrs. 
Cholmondeley,  Forester,  and  Ralph  Lambton  were 
among  the  hardest  men  of  the  hunt,  and  Mr.  R.  Lambton 
it  was  who  succeeded  his  brother  and  Mr.  Baker  in  the 
mastership  of  the  Lambton  hounds. 

It  is  supposed  that  Mr.  Meynell's  last  appearance  at 
the  covert  side  was  at  Gumley  in  January  1798,  after 
which  date  his  son  took  command,  though  Mr.  Meynell 
still  remained  actual  master.  Mr.  Meynell,  junr.,  how- 
ever, died  in  the  year  1800,  from  the  effects  of  a  fall 
from  his  horse. 

Mr.  Meynell  lived  on  until  the  14th  of  December 
1808,  when  he  died  in  London,  at  his  house  in  Chapel 
Street,  Mayfair,  at  the  age  of  seventy-three,  as  some 
say  ;  but  the  Sporting  Magazine  and  the  Leicester  Jour- 
nal give  his  age  at  the  time  of  his  death  as  eighty- 
one,  in  which  case  he  would  have  been  born  in  1727, 
and  this  is  the  more  probable  story  of  the  two,  as  one 
can  hardly  imagine  that  he  would  have  been  a  master 


MR.    MEYNELL 


67 


of  the  hounds  and  married  before  he  attained  the  age  of 
nineteen  years.  Mr.  Meynell  was  buried  in  the  family 
vault  at  Bradley  in  Derbyshire,  and  thus  ended  the  life 
of  a  master  of  foxhounds  whose  name  will  never  pass 
out  of  memory  as  long  as  fox-hunting  continues  to  be 
one  of  the  chief  of  English  sports. 


CHAPTER    III 

LORD    SEFTON    (1800-1805) 

LORD    FOLEY    (1805-1806) 

MR.   ASSHETON    SMITH    (1806-1817] 


69 


CHAPTER  III 

LORD     SEFTON 

1800-1805 

LORD  SEFTON  will  take  my  hounds  at  the  end 
j  of  the  season,  and  I  know  he  hopes  to  succeed 
me  in  hunting  the  country."  So  runs  a  letter,  dated  the 
19th  March  1800,  from  Mr.  Meynell  to  the  Duke  of 
Rutland.  The  second  Earl  of  Sefton  was  as  o-ood  as 
his  word.  He  bought  Mr.  Meynell's  hounds  en  masse, 
and  added  to  them  his  own,  with  which  he  had  been 
hunting  a  part  of  Oxfordshire.  Tom  Wingfield  and 
the  kennel-man  were  sent  to  bring  them  to  Quorn,  from 
Combe  Abbey,  and  on  the  return  journey  the  cavalcade 
passed  through  Leicester  on  the  Good  Friday  of  1800, 
just  as  the  people  were  going  to  church,  whereupon 
Tom  Wingfield  remarked  to  his  colleague,  "  Jack,  we 
shouldn't  be  here,"  Tom  no  doubt  feeling  that  they  were 
creating  something  of  a  scandal,  and  probably  setting 
some  people  against  fox-hunting.  However,  they  reached 
Quorn  safely,  and  when  the  two  packs  were  united  the 
kennels  were  full  indeed. 

When  Lord  Sefton  took  over  Mr.  Meynell's  hounds 
he  retained  Jack  Raven,  the  huntsman,  as  well.  Raven, 
though  getting  on  in  years,  was  still  efficient ;  while  the 
new  master,  whose  hounds  had  been  hunted  by  old 
Stephen  Goodall,  did  not  care  to  discharge  his  old 
huntsman,  who  had  served  him  well  and  faithfully,  so,  as 
he  had  so  many  hounds — rather  over  a  hundred  couples 


72  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

— he  determined  on  the  bold  experiment  of  having  two 
packs  and  two  huntsmen.  With  two  Kings  of  Brent- 
ford in  the  field,  many  disagreements,  the  outcome  of 
jealousy,  might  have  been  anticipated  ;  but  it  speaks 
well  for  master  and  men  that  nothing  of  the  kind  oc- 
curred, and  everything  went  on  as  smoothly  as  possible. 
The  arrangement  was  that  Raven  should  be  head-man, 
the  chief  in  kennel,  and  should  hunt  the  old  pack  on  two 
days  in  the  week  in  the  best  part  of  the  Quorn  country, 
the  younger  hounds  hunting,  under  Goodall,  the  wood- 
lands on  the  other  two  days.  One  cannot  help  praising 
Goodall  for  his  willingness  to  play  second  fiddle,  but  the 
arrangement  was  the  only  possible  way  out  of  a  difficulty. 
The  two  huntsmen  were  about  as  much  unlike  as  two 
men  could  be.  "  Nature  had  interdicted  superior  horse- 
manship to  Goodall,"  wrote  "  Nimrod,"  "  for  although 
she  had  given  him  his  full  share  of  brains,  she  formed 
him  with  a  great  carcase  upon  short  legs  (very  good 
qualities  in  a  horse)  and  an  aptitude  to  feed  (still  better 
in  a  hog)  that  would  not  be  satisfied  until  the  maximum 
exceeded  twenty  stone."  With  a  frame  which  must  have 
much  resembled,  if  it  did  not  exceed,  that  of  Charles 
(Bob)  Ward  of  the  Hertfordshire,  Stephen  Goodall  was 
not  built  to  shine  over  the  more  stiffly  fenced  portions  of 
Leicestershire,  even  as  the  country  then  was  ;  but  like 
many  another  heavy  man  (when  his  nerves  are  in  the 
right  place)  Goodall  would,  to  use  a  phrase  of  Whyte- 
Melville's,  "  smuggle "  himself  and  his  horse  over  a 
country  in  surprising  fashion. 

Jack  Raven,  on  the  other  hand,  was  moulded  more 
on  the  lines  of  James  Pigg  (though  no  one  would  think 
so  after  looking  at  the  picture  of  him  in  which  he  and 
the  hound  Glider  are  represented  in  Mr.  Meynell's 
plainly  furnished  sitting-room)  :  he  was  tall  and  wiry 
and  had  a  fine  melodious  voice,  whereas  Stephen  Good- 
all   is   reported  to  have  been   very  weak  in  the  throat. 


LORD    SEFTON  73 

Neither  huntsman  appears  to  have  been  very  free  with 
the  horn,  as  one  follower  of  the  Quorn  says  that  he 
only  remembers  to  have  heard  it  once  in  four  days, 
and  that  was  when  a  hound  was  lost.  He  was,  how- 
ever, a  master  of  hound-lore  and  hunting.  So,  too,  was 
Raven,  and  several  stories  testifying  to  his  knowledge 
of  hunting  are  extant.  On  one  occasion  a  famous 
hound  called  Guzman  was  running  a  hare,  the  hound 
being  on  one  side  of  a  hedge  and  the  hare  on  the 
other.  A  whipper-in  galloped  on  to  stop  Guzman, 
when  Raven  called  to  him,  "  Let  him  alone  ;  he  will 
stop  of  his  own  accord  when  he  sees  what  he  is 
running."     And  so  he  did. 

Jack  Raven's  death  is  nowhere  mentioned,  so  far  as 
I  have  been  able  to  discover  ;  but  on  very  good  autho- 
rity I  learn  that  he  was  drowned  in  the  river  Soar,  not 
far  from  the  kennels,  while  returning  home  after  "  a  pipe 
and  a  glass."  It  is  supposed  that  he  slipped  off  the 
bank. 

The  establishment  of  Mr.  Meynell,  though  framed 
on  the  lines  of  efficiency  and  governed  by  a  master 
hand,  does  not  appear  to  have  excelled  what  may  be 
termed  a  strictly  workmanlike  standard ;  but  Lord 
Sefton  carried  on  the  Hunt  with  great  magnificence. 
He  was  at  his  prime  when  he  succeeded  to  the  country  ; 
he  smartened  up  the  men  and  their  livery  ;  put  them 
on  much  better  horses,  while  the  master  himself,  a 
welter  weight,  rode  the  best  hunters  that  money  could 
buy.  For  Rowland,  Plato,  and  Gooseberry  he  gave  well 
on  for  a  thousand  pounds  each,  while  to  Mr.  Loraine 
Smith  he  offered  eight  hundred  pounds  for  his  famous 
Hollyhock  horse.  Unfortunately  for  the  "long  Squire 
of  Enderby  Hall"  the  offer  was  refused,  as  the  horse 
died  not  long  afterwards  during  a  run,  from  the  rupture 
of  a  blood-vessel.  The  prices  of  good  hunters,  however, 
ruled   high   in   those   days,  as  in   1802  two   horses,   the 


74  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

property  of  a  Leicestershire  gentleman,  were  sold,  one 
for  750  guineas,  the  other  for  650  guineas. 

Heavy  weight  though  he  was,  Lord  Sefton  was  a 
capital  hand  at  getting  over  a  country  ;  he  was  a  rare 
hand  at  galloping  between  his  fences,  and  had  the  knack 
of  making  up  lost  ground,  while  he  took  the  fullest 
advantage  of  every  turn  of  the  hounds.  Like  a  later 
master,  Mr.  Osbaldeston,  he  very  much  disliked  timber ; 
but  if  he  occasionally  shirked  a  stiff  rail,  he  turned  away 
from  nothing  else ;  and  his  weight,  which  eventually 
caused  him  to  give  up  fox-hunting  altogether,  enabled 
him  to  bore  his  way  through  the  thickest  blackthorn 
fences  in  his  country. 

Mr.  Edward  Goulbourn,  the  author  of  "  The  Epwell 
Hunt ;  or,  Black  Collars  in  the  Rear,"  written  some- 
where about  the  year  1807,  wrote  a  burlesque  descrip- 
tion of  a  run  he  saw  in  Leicestershire,  but  which  was 
never  published,  and  he  makes  mention  of  Lord  Sefton 
in  these  words  : — 

Earl  Sefton  came  next,  and  for  beef  on  the  rib 
No  Leicestershire  bullock  was  rounder  ; 

A  wonderful  weight  at  a  wonderful  rate, 
He  flew  like  a  twenty-four  pounder. 

In  all  departments  the  Hunt  was  most  ably  adminis- 
tered, for  Lord  Sefton  was  an  admirable  man  of  busi- 
ness, seeing  himself  to  the  details  of  kennel  and  stable, 
much  as  Mr.  Meynell  had  done.  Unlike  some  of  his 
successors,  he  did  not  land  himself  in  difficulties  by  over 
expenditure  and  extravagance.  He  was  a  fine  coach- 
man, kept  a  fine  stable  of  coach  horses,  and  his  drag 
or   landau  1    was    often    seen    at    the    covert    side.       In 


1  Amateurs  who  kept  their  own  conveyances  drove  four  horses  in  a  kind 
of  barouche  more  often  than  in  a  coach.  In  the  sixties  an  old  gentleman 
whose  name  was,  I  think,  Box,  and  who  lived  at  Cookham,  used  to  drive 
four  horses  from  the  box  of  a  landau. 


LORD    SEFTON  75 

London,  too,  one  of  his  equipages  created  no  little 
sensation  in  St.  James's  Park  by  the  Horse  Guards. 
The  vehicle,  in  which  were  the  ladies  Molineaux,  is  de- 
scribed as  having  resembled  two  large  chaises  fastened 
together,  one  behind  the  other,  the  shafts  being  removed 
from  the  second  chaise.  The  two  bodies  were  on  four 
wheels,  and  behind  the  united  chaises  there  was  a  species 
of  dickey  for  the  groom.  This  made  three  departments 
for  passengers  ;  with  the  groom  there  were  eight  per- 
sons, and  a  pair  of  horses  drew  the  vehicle.  After 
giving  up  the  hounds  Lord  Sefton  hunted  for  a  few 
years,  and  later  on  we  read  of  him  in  the  Greville 
Memoirs. 

"  Five  new  peerages  came  out  yesterday,"  wrote  the 
Clerk  of  the  Council  on  the  15th  June  1 83 1,  "Sefton, 
Kinnaird,  Fingall,  Leitrim,  and  Agar  Ellis."  Mr.  Gre- 
ville, who  went  to  Goodwood  for  the  races  and  was  kept 
there  by  an  attack  of  gout  after  every  one  else  had  left, 
was  not  perhaps  in  a  very  good  humour  when  he  wrote 
on  the  20th  August,  after  his  arrival  in  town  : — 

Sefton  has  just  been  here,  who  talks  blusteringly  of  the  peers 
that  are  to  be  made,  no  matter  at  what  cost  of  character  to  the 
House  of  Lords,  anything  rather  than  be  beaten  ;  but  I  am  not  sure 
that  he  knows  anything.  In  such  matters  as  these  he  is  (however 
sharp)  no  better  than  a  fool — no  knowledge,  no  information,  no 
reflection  or  combination  ;  prejudices,  partialities,  and  sneers  are 
what  his  political  wisdom  consists  of;  but  he  is  Lord  Grey's  dme 
damnie. 

To  return  to  hunting,  however,  the  stables  at  Quorn 
were  a  sight  to  behold,  and  at  sunset  a  patent  lamp, 
shedding  what  in  those  days  was  considered  a  great 
amount  of  light,  was  suspended  at  every  fourth  stall. 

"Cork-legged  Jones"  having  died  just  before  Mr. 
Meynell  gave  up  the  hounds,  Joe  Harrison,  who  succeeded 
him,  and  Tom  Wingfield  were  Lord  Sefton's  whippers- 


76  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

in.  Both  of  them  were  good  men,  and  both  eventually 
became  huntsmen,  Tom  Wingfield  becoming  very  famous, 
one-eyed  man  though  he  was  ;  but  it  was  said  of  him 
that  he  could  see  more  with  his  one  eye  than  most  men 
could  with  two.  His  partial  loss  of  sight  certainly  did 
not  affect  his  riding,  for  a  bolder  man  never  crossed  a 
horse.  One  day,  on  seeing  a  follower  of  Lord  Sefton's 
hounds  decline  a  big  fence,  he  half  turned  round  in  his 
saddle  and  remarked  to  some  one  who  was  following, 
"  I'm  thinking,  sir,  that  that  there  gentleman  has  no 
business  in  our  shire." 

One  of  the  critics  of  the  time  declared  that  Lord 
Sefton  cared  but  little  for  hounds,  but  made  much  of  the 
standard  of  men  and  horses.  To  a  certain  extent  this 
may  be  true.  He  certainly  was  not  the  hound  man 
Mr.  Meynell  was,  but  that  gentleman  was  always  ready 
with  advice  and  assistance,  and  to  him  the  new  master 
owed  a  good  deal.  On  the  other  hand,  Lord  Sefton 
could  have  been  by  no  means  indifferent  to  the  kennel, 
for  when  he  said,  as  a  reason  for  giving  up  the  hounds, 
that  he  could  not  find  horses  to  carry  him  as  fast  as  he 
wished  to  go,  people  said  that  it  was  a  judgment  upon 
him  for  having  bred  his  hounds  so  fast,  though  how  he 
could  have  made  so  great  an  alteration  in  the  pace  of  his 
pack  in  five  seasons  is  not  clear  ;  for  Mr.  Meynell's  were 
by  no  means  slow  hounds  ;  nor  were  Mr.  John  Warde's. 
However,  there  is  the  story. 

In  March  1805  Lord  Sefton's  hounds  enjoyed  a  good 
run  under  somewhat  singular  circumstances. 

A  certain  fox  was  reported  to  have  made  many  depredations 
upon  the  poultry  of  Mr.  Stone  of  Barrow,  and  him  Lord  Sefton 
eventually  killed  with  five  couples  of  hounds  only.  We  find  only 
two  instances  of  a  few  couples  of  hounds  being  used  as  the  Devon 
and  Somerset  staghounds  employ  tufters  ;  but  whether  these  five 
couples  were  so  used,  or  whether  they  went  away  with  the  fox, 
leaving  the  main  body  in  the  lurch,  one  cannot  discover.     At  any 


LORD    SEFTON  77 

rate  the  fox  was  in  a  few  minutes  found  in  a  hedgerow  on  Mr. 
Stone's  farm,  and  went  away  in  view  of  the  hounds,  which,  for 
about  half-an-hour,  ran  very  fast  indeed.  The  fox  at  last  obtained 
a  start,  and  for  a  couple  of  hours  the  pace  fortunately  moderated 
considerably.  The  little  pack  worked  wonderfully  well  up  to 
Thrussington,  where  they  hunted  the  fox  in  and  out  of  a  number 
of  yards  and  gardens,  coming  up  to  him  in  one  of  the  latter.  A 
second  time  he  went  away  in  view  of  the  hounds,  but  then 
they  gave  him  no  rest,  killing  him  after  a  three  hours'  hunt  near 
Brooksby  Earths.  Report  says  that  the  only  three  horsemen 
up  at  the  finish  were  Mr.  Stone,  Goodall,  who  was  hunting  the 
hounds,  and  Jack  Raven,  who  was  perhaps  out  for  a  holiday. 

To  Lord  Sefton  has  been  ascribed  the  invention  of 
second  horses  in  the  field,  an  arrangement  which  in  later 
times  has  been  the  cause  of  much  grumbling,  and,  as  in 
the  Quorn  and  some  other  hunts,  of  special  regulations 
being  promulgated  by  the  respective  masters.  Lord 
Sefton  may  perhaps  have  made  some  alteration  in  the 
use  of  them,  but  men  rode  more  than  one  horse  a  day 
nearly  three  centuries  before  he  became  an  M.F.H. 
Henry  VIII.,  a  welter  weight,  worthy  to  rank  with  Lord 
Sefton  himself,  once  got  to  the  bottom  of  eight  horses  in 
a  single  day,  while  in  the  account  of  a  run  with  the 
Charlton  (afterwards  the  Goodwood)  hounds  in  1738, 
contributed  by  Mr.  T.  J.  Bennett  to  vol.  xv.  of  the 
"  Sussex  Archaeological  Collection,"  we  read  that 

Lord    Harcourt    blew    his    first    horse,   and   that    his    second 
subsequently  felt  the  effects  of  long  legs  and  a  sudden  steep  .  . 
while  in  Goodwood  Park,  the  Duke  of  Richmond  chose  to  send 
three  lame  horses  back   to  Charlton,  and  took   Saucy   Face  and 
Sir  William  that  were  luckily  at  Goodwood. 

There  is  nothing  new  under  the  sun,  they  say.  Lord 
Sefton's  method  of  employing  a  second  horse,  however, 
was  in  direct  opposition  to  the  course  adopted  by  Lord 
Lonsdale,    who  ordained   that   all   second   horsemen,   to 


78  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

whom  his  own  second  horsemen  act  as  pilots,  should  keep 
to  the  roads  and  bridle  paths.  Lord  Sefton  had  a  light 
groom  in  livery,  and  he  and  George  Raven,  John's 
nephew,  dressed  as  a  whipper-in,  rode  his  spare  horses, 
for  he  always  had  three  out,  not  to  points  as  is  the 
present  fashion,  but  in  his  wake,  and  he  changed  from 
one  to  the  other  as  occasion  required,  which  appears  to 
have  been  about  every  fifteen  or  twenty  minutes,  though 
on  one  occasion  one  of  his  best  horses,  Loadstar,  carried 
his  owner  for  an  hour  and  five  minutes.  John  Leech,  it 
may  be  remembered,  made  merry  over  the  different  styles 
in  which  second  horses  were  ridden  in  his  time. 

In  November  1802  it  was  stated  that  the  Ouorn  had 
experienced  little  more  than  a  succession  of  blank  days, 
there  being  but  few  foxes  in  the  country.  Some  people 
attributed  the  prevailing  state  of  things  to  the  severe 
winter  of  1 801-2  having  killed  so  many  gorse  coverts, 
while  others  accounted  for  it  by  acknowledging  that  "an 
unfortunate  misunderstanding"  existed  between  the  Hunt 
and  the  farmers,  who,  following  a  course  adopted  in  other 
parts  of  England  in  consequence  of  the  Game  Acts, 
decided  to  kill  foxes.  In  spite  of  a  contradiction  of  the 
above  statements,  there  appears  to  be  no  doubt  that 
foxes  were  few  and  far  between,  as  when  the  season 
1802-3  was  near  its  close  the  Leicestershire  men  con- 
fessed that  they  were  disappointed  with  the  season's 
results.  The  turned-out  foxes  would  not  run,  and  they 
were,  wrote  a  critic,  "  but  a  bad  substitute  for  those 
oallant  foxes  which,  when  old  Meynell  managed  the 
hounds  (whose  courteous  and  conciliatory  manners  pre- 
vailed on  the  farmers  to  preserve  the  game),  showed  such 
straightforward  runs  and  short  bursts."  Moreover,  several 
of  those  who  had  for  some  time  hunted  with  the  Quorn 
now  stopped  away,  in  the  hope  of  finding  some  more 
favoured  locality,  among  the  absentees  being  Lord  May- 
nard,  Lord  C.  Somerset,  Sir  H.  Featherstonhaugh,  and 


LORD    SEFTON  79 

Mr.  Charles  Wyndham.  Others,  however,  declared  that 
the  sport  had  been  up  to  the  average,  and  that  the 
farmers  and  members  of  the  Hunt  had  never  been  on 
more  amicable  terms  ;  so  which  story  is  the  true  one, 
it  is  impossible  to  say.  Nevertheless  rents  did  not 
fall,  for  small  houses  were  let  at  ^200  a  year,  and  the 
accommodation  was  meagre  in  the  extreme  in  many 
cases. 

Among  the  shining  lights  of  Leicestershire  about  this 
time  was  Lord  Villiers  (afterwards  the  fifth  Earl  of 
Jersey).  He  was  born  in  1773,1  and  before  he  reached 
his  majority  knew  his  way  over  Leicestershire  pretty 
well,  consequently  he  hunted  in  the  time  of  Mr.  Meynell. 
Lord  Jersey  enjoyed  the  reputation  of  being  one  of  the 
hardest,  boldest,  most  judicious  and  elegant  horsemen 
that  ever  crossed  Leicestershire  or  any  other  county. 
But  he  rode  grand  horses,  up  to  much  more  than  his 
weight,  and  he  was  probably  the  only  man  who  ever 
rode  a  Derby  winner  as  a  hunter.  This  was  the 
Duke  of  Grafton's  Tyrant,  by  Pot-8-o's,  the  winner 
of  the  Derby  in  1802.  He  was  a  strong,  short-legged 
horse  of  great  stoutness,  but  he  won  no  race  after  the 
Derby,  and,  as  he  proved  utterly  useless  at  the  stud, 
Lord  Jersey,  taken  by  his  make  and  shape,  bought  him 
for  a  hunter,  and  a  capital  bargain  he  turned  out,  for  he 
took  to  jumping  in  the  kindest  manner  possible,  and  on 
one  occasion,  after  an  excellent  run  from  Shipton,  his 
lordship  declared  that  he  believed  Tyrant  had  jumped  as 
high  as  the  ceiling.  Besides  this  Derby  winner,  how- 
ever, Lord  Jersey  had  many  other  good  horses,  and 
perhaps  his  favourite  hunter  was  a  chestnut  horse  named 
Cecil,  which  he  rode  for  several,  if  not  many,  seasons 
without  getting  a  fall.  He  was  not  only  ridden  in  a 
snaffle  bridle,  but  was  a  snaffle-bridle  horse — the  two  are 
not  synonymous,  as  a  high  authority  has  pointed  out — 

1   He  died  on  the  3rd  October  1859. 


80  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

and  he  once  carried  his  owner  in  a  memorable  run  with 
the  Burton,  when  Mr.  Osbaldeston  hunted  the  country. 
The  pair  beat  everybody  else,  and  Cecil,  at  the  finish, 
jumped  a  big  stile  with  a  ditch  on  the  taking  off  side, 
landing  in  the  field  in  which  the  hounds  pulled  down  the 
fox.  Harrington  was  another  snaffle-bridle  horse,  and 
he  stood  high  both  in  stature — seventeen  hands — and 
in  his  owner's  estimation,  while  Shuttlecock  was  another 
horse  bad  to  beat. 

Among  other  foremost  riders  of  Lord  Sefton's  time 
were  Sir  Stephen  Glynn,  Mr.  Assheton  Smith  (occa- 
sionally), the  Hon.  Berkeley  Craven,  the  Hon.  John 
Vanneck  (afterwards  Lord  Huntingfield),  Mr.  Hawkes, 
Col.  Mellish,  Mr.  Charles  Meynell,  and  Col.  Forester. 

Although,  owing  to  his  weight,  he  could  not  partici- 
pate in  any  other  branch  of  the  chase  than  otter-hunting, 
casual  mention  should  be  made  of  Daniel  Lambert,  who 
at  the  time  of  his  death,  in  1809,  weighed  just  over  fifty- 
two  stone.  His  father  had  been  gamekeeper  to  Lord 
Stamford,  and  Daniel  himself  was  master  of  the  Leicester 
gaol,  where  he  acquired  a  great  reputation  for  humanity 
and  benevolence.  He  gave  up  the  post  in  1805,  a  ^ew 
years  after  the  death  of  his  father.  Daniel  Lambert  had 
the  most  intimate  acquaintance  with  the  Racing  Calen- 
dar, and  was  a  great  breeder  of  game-cocks  and  dogs. 
After  his  death  his  dogs  were  sold  at  Tattersall's.  Some 
setters  realised  41  guineas,  26  guineas,  22  guineas,  32 
guineas,  22  guineas,  and  20  guineas,  the  total  being  218 
guineas. 

Soon  after  Lord  Sefton  took  the  Ouorn  hounds,  the 
fame  of  the  Hunt  had  reached  France,  where  it  was 
spoken  of  with  respect,  and  Mr.  Meynell's  name  was 
always  connected  with  it.  A  few  Parisian  sportsmen 
announced  their  intention  of  visiting  Leicestershire 
during  the  season  1802-3,  and  when  Tom  Wingfield 
heard  of  it,  he  is  said  to  have  remarked  that  Lord  Sefton 


LORD    SEFTON  81 

would  show  his  visitors  plenty  of  hospitality  at  Quorn, 
but  would  turn  his  back  upon  them  in  the  field  and  leave 
them  far  behind.  Whatever  may  have  been  the  quality 
of  the  sport  during-  Lord  Sefton's  early  seasons  (it  is 
more  than  probable  that  it  was  a  good  deal  better  than 
some  of  the  grumblers  tried  to  make  out),  it  was  at  any 
rate  of  a  satisfactory  nature  during  Lord  Sefton's  last 
season,  1804-5),  f°r  runs  came  thick  and  fast,  especially 
in  the  forest  and  in  the  Six  Hills  district. 

Towards  the  close  of  1804  Lord  Sefton,  to  the 
general  regret,  announced  his  intention  of  giving  up  the 
country,  offering  at  the  same  time  his  hounds  and  horses, 
together  with  a  liberal  subscription  (to  which  it  was 
understood  the  usual  followers  of  the  Hunt  would  contri- 
bute) to  Mr.  Loraine  Smith,  if  he  would  become  master, 
and  the  general  opinion  is  said  to  have  been  that  Mr. 
Loraine  Smith  was  the  only  man  in  the  country  who 
would  be  equal  to  the  task  of  carrying  on  so  great  an 
undertaking.  This  statement,  which  is  made  in  the 
Sporting  Magazine  for  March  1804,  does  not,  however, 
square  with  a  letter  written  by  Lord  Sefton,  dated  Gros- 
venor  Square,  April  14,  1804.  The  letter  in  question, 
which  is  quoted  in  Mr.  J.  Cradock's  "  Literary  and  Mis- 
cellaneous Memoirs,"  states  :  "  I  beg  leave  to  inform  you 
that  Lord  Foley  having  now  a  share  with  me  in  the 
hounds,  we  shall  in  future  have  to  return  our  joint  thanks 
for  those  indulgences  which  we  cannot  help  hoping  the 
Hunt  will  continue  to  receive  from  you."  As  Lord 
Foley  therefore  had  a  share  in  the  hounds  as  early  as 
the  spring  of  1804,  it  is  not  easy  to  understand  why 
Lord  Sefton  should  have  offered  hounds  and  horses  to 
Mr.  Loraine  Smith,  especially  as  he  was  succeeded  by 
Lord  Foley  in  1805,  and  it  was  said  that  Sir  Henry 
Peyton  "had  a  wheel"  in  the  Quorn  coach,  though  his 
name  never  appeared. 


82  THE    QUORN    HUNT 


LORD    FOLEY 

1805-1806 

THE   new  master   bought   Quorndon   from   his   pre- 
decessor, and,  it  is  to  be  assumed,  Lord  Sefton's  share 
in  the  hounds  and  the  hunt  horses.      Lord  Foley,  who 
had  been  a  friend  and  follower  of  Mr.   Meynell,  hunted 
with  the  Quorn  during  Lord  Sefton's  mastership,  and  so 
knew  the  country  and  the  people.     While  hunting  with 
Lord  Harborough's  hounds  in  1801  he  had  a  very  bad  fall. 
His  horse's  hind  legs  dropped  into  a  hole  and  he  fell  back 
on  his  rider,  who  was   rendered  insensible,  and  was  so 
much  injured  that  he  could  not  be  moved  to  Stapleford 
Park,  Lord  Harborough's  residence,  but  had  to  remain 
at  a  farm-house.      He  managed,  however,  to  journey  to 
Witley  Court  by  the   21st  of  December,  on  which  day 
he  came  of  age.      Lord  Foley  was  the  third  of  his  line, 
and  came  of  a  family  possessed  of  a  fondness  for  hunting, 
his  father  having  hunted  a  portion  of  Worcestershire  and 
a  small  slice  of  Oxfordshire  until  ]  776,  in  which  year  he 
sold   his  hounds   to  the  fourth    Lord   Fitzwilliam,  when 
he  started  the   Milton  pack.      Lord   Sefton's   successor, 
though  he  mounted  his  men  very  well,  does  not  appear 
to  have  been  much  of  a  hound  man,  but  as  he  did  not 
have  the  pack  quite  two  seasons,  not  a  great  deal  of 
harm  could  have  been  done.      He  was  a  brilliant  horse- 
man, and   being  really  fond  of  hunting,  would  no  doubt 
in    time    have   learned    the    lesson    of  experience,    and 
eventually   have   blossomed   into  a   very  good    M.F.H. 
He  had  several  qualifications  which  go  to  the  making  of 


LORD    FOLEY  83 

a  successful  master  ;  he  was,  as  already  mentioned,  bold 
over  a  country ;  he  had  engaging  manners,  and  was 
courteous  to,  and  popular  with,  every  one.  The  fixtures, 
even  from  the  time  of  Mr.  Meynell,  were  advertised  in 
somewhat  casual  fashion.  During  some  seasons  they 
were  notified  with  tolerable  regularity,  and  then  per- 
haps a  season  or  two  would  pass  with  hardly  an  an- 
nouncement. In  Lord  Foley's  time,  however,  hunting 
men  in  general  expressed  a  wish  that  the  appointments 
of  all  the  packs  should  be  made  public,  and  the  Leicester 
Journal,  among  other  papers,  invited  those  who  were 
acquainted  with  the  fixtures  to  send  them  to  the  office. 

Unluckily  for  the  Ouorn,  Lord  Foley  "flirted  with 
the  elephant's  tooth,"  as  dicing  was  called  at  that  time, 
while  he  was  also  the  racing  confederate  of  the  notori- 
ously extravagant  Colonel  Mellish,  to  whom  it  was  said 
the  Prince  of  Wales  offered  to  grant  perpetual  leave  from 
the  10th  Hussars  lest  he  should  lead  the  younger  officers 
of  that  regiment  into  imitating  his  lavishness.  Mr. 
Raikes,  who  for  something  like  a  quarter  of  a  century 
lived  upon  terms  of  great  intimacy  with  Lord  Foley,  has 
left  it  on  record  in  his  journal  that  the  latter  was  a  some- 
what important  person  on  the  turf,  and  writing  of  the 
days  when  the  Prince  of  Wales  patronised  Brighton  and 
attended  the  races  there  and  at  Lewes,  gives  a  vivid 
description  of  the  scene  on  the  Steyne,  where  the  morn- 
ing betting  took  place,  and  where  Lord  Foley  and 
Colonel  Mellish  were  conspicuous  characters. 

Dicing,  racing,  profuse  hospitality,  and  the  master- 
ship of  the  Ouorn  hounds,  however,  caused  money  to 
vanish  quickly,  and  for  one  reason  and  another  Lord 
F"oley  gave  up  the  country  late  in    1806,1  after  having 

1  Much  of  the  trouble  of  ascertaining  dates  arises  from  the  fact  of  the 
papers  being  in  the  habit  of  using  the  names  of  past  masters.  The  Quorn 
were  called  "  Meynell's  "  hounds  after  Lord  Sefton  took  them,  and  then,  in 
a  local  paper  dated  23rd  January  1827,  we  read  that  Lord  Foley's  hounds 
met  at  Oadby  Toll-bar  on  the  20th.  In  the  very  next  sentence  Mr.  Assheton 
Smith  is  spoken  of  as  the  master. 


84  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

showed  tolerably  good  sport  during  the  previous 
season.  Being-  thus  more  free  to  follow  his  own  bent, 
he  went  in  more  for  racing.  Lord  Foley  died  on 
the  morning  of  the  16th  April  1833,  after  a  few  days' 
illness.  In  his  journal  Mr.  Raikes  says  the  kindest 
possible  things  of  his  deceased  friend,  whose  wife  was 
sister  to  the  Duke  of  Leinster,  and  by  whom  he  had 
eight  children.  The  Worcestershire  property,  including 
Witley  Court,  was  sold  for  ^890,000,  that  being  the  sole 
means  by  which  his  eldest  son,  who  was  most  anxious  to 
pay  off  his  father's  racing  and  other  debts,  could  secure 
a  modest  income.  The  purchasers,  it  is  hardly  necessary 
to  state,  were  the  trustees  of  Lord  Dudley's  will  on  behalf 
of  Lord  Ward,  then  a  minor,  who  succeeded  to  Lord 
Dudley's  enormous  wealth. 


MR.    ASSHETON    SMITH 


MR.  ASSHETON   SMITH 
1806-1817 

FROM  1806,  in  which  year  Mr.  Assheton  Smith  took 
the  Ouorn,  down  to  1827,  when  Mr.  Osbaldeston 
brought  to  a  close  his  second  period  of  mastership,  the 
Ouorn  country  was  in  the  hands  of  the  above-named 
two  masters,  and  also  for  a  couple  of  seasons  in  those  of 
Sir  Bellingham  Graham,  who  came  between  Mr.  Osbal- 
deston's  two  reigns.  The  Life  of  Mr.  Assheton  Smith 
havinof  [rone  through  several  editions  (it  takes  in  all  that 
"The  Druid"  wrote  about  him),  it  is  assumed  that  every 
one  having  an  interest  in,  or  knowledge  of,  the  Ouorn 
country  is  familiar  with  its  pages,  so  it  is  not  proposed  to 
reproduce  more  of  what  has  been  written  than  is  neces- 
sary to  carry  on  the  story  of  the  Hunt,  and  there  is 
not  very  much  to  be  said  about  this  famous  fox-hunter 
beyond  what  has  already  appeared  in  print  ;  but  a  few 
incidents  and  anecdotes  which  do  not  form  part  of  the 
book  have  been  collected.  The  Life  of  Mr.  Smith  (all,  or 
nearly  all,  of  it  appeared  in  the  columns  of  the  Field 
newspaper  in  1855)  includes,  in  addition  to  what  Dick 
Christian  told  "The  Druid,"  copious  extracts  from  "Nim- 
rod's"  "  Hunting  Tours"  and  "  Hunting  Reminiscences." 
Although  no  biography  of  Mr.  Osbaldeston  has 
appeared  in  book  form,  so  much  has  been  written  about 
him  that  his  career  as  master  of  the  Ouorn  has  here 
been  dealt  with  at  less  length  than  would  otherwise  have 
been  the  case.  With  these  preliminary  remarks,  the 
thread  of  the  story  may  be  resumed. 


86  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

After    Lord    Foley    had   presided    for    but    a   single 
season  over   the   fortunes  of  the  Quorn    Hunt,   he  was 
succeeded   by   Mr.   Assheton   Smith    in    1806.      He  had 
occasionally  made  Leicestershire  his  headquarters,    and 
hunted  in  the  county,  for  he  was  in  the  famous  Billesdon 
Coplow    run  of  1800,   and   is    favourably   mentioned   in 
Mr.  Lowth's  verse,  as  well  as  in  one  or  two  other  songs 
which  the  run  suggested.     Mr.  Smith  was  just  thirty  years 
of  age  when   he  became  master  of  the  Quorn,   having 
been    born    in    Queen    Anne    Street,    London,  in    1 776. 
Though,   as   mentioned  just    now,    he   hunted   with   the 
Quorn,  he  was  evidently  not  well  known  to  the  followers 
of  that  pack  at  large,  for  on  one  occasion,  when  out  with 
them,  he  was  seen  riding  a  refusing  horse  several  times  at 
a  flight  of  high  rails,  and  people  asked  one  another  who 
this  determined  horseman  might  be  ?      Little  did  they 
think  that  in  the  rider  of  this  refuser  they  saw  the  re- 
doubtable Tom  Smith,  their  future  master.      Mr.  Smith 
was  undoubtedly  a  fine  and  bold  horseman,  but  he  could 
not  work   miracles   on  horseback  any    more  than   could 
any   one   else.       "Nimrod"   tells   a  story  of  how  when 
galloping   over  a  field,  and   looking  behind  him  to  see 
how  his  hounds  were  coming,  his  horse  galloped  into  a  . 
pond  rather  than  turn  a  foot  out  of  the  straight  course. 
In  making  Mr.  Smith  out  a  great  horseman,  his  eulogists 
strike  one  as  having  rather  overdone  it.      For  example, 
in  Sir  John  Eardley  Wilmot's  "  Life  of  Mr.  Smith  "  it  is 
stated    that    after    a    long    run   with   the   Ted  worth   the 
Squire,  who   had   to  leave   his  beaten  horse  at  an   inn, 
borrowed  a  Shetland  pony  to  carry  him  home,  and,  says 
his  biographer,   "  his  masterly  hand  persuaded  the  little 
animal  to  carry  him  to  his  own  door  within  the  hour,  the 
distance  being  a  dozen  miles,  good  measure."     The  hand 
may  have  been  "  masterly,"  but  to  ride  a  Shetland  pony 
twelve  miles  in  an  hour  is  trying  him  tolerably  high,  and 
no  amount  of  "hands"  can  get  over  the  fact.     Then, 


MR.    ASSHETON    SMITH  87 

again,  it  is  said  in  Mr.  Smith's  Life  that  every  horse, 
whatever  his  nature,  became  a  hunter  as  soon  as  Mr. 
Smith  was  on  his  back.  That  this  was  not  so  is  clear 
from  the  fact  that  the  horse  above  mentioned  refused 
with  his  owner  on  the  occasion  referred  to,  and  the  fact 
of  the  refusing  is  put  forward  by  way  of  emphasising 
the  rider's  determination.  Then,  again,  there  was  Fire 
King,  "as  unmanageable  a  savage  as  ever  wore  a 
bridle."  Nevertheless,  a  Mr.  Denham  managed  to  hold 
his  own  on  him  ;  and  eventually  he  became  Mr.  Smith's, 
and  the  same  biographer  who  writes  that  Mr.  Smith 
could  make  every  horse  into  a  hunter  admits  that  le 
grand  chasseur  sent  him  home  on  hunting  days  seven  or 
eight  times  "  before  he  could  ride  him  with  confidence," 
though  afterwards  he  succeeded  in  making  him  go 
quietly.  These  remarks  are  made  not  with  the  inten- 
tion of  detracting  from  the  reputation  of  one  who  was 
beyond  all  question  foremost  of  the  boldest  horsemen 
that  ever  crossed  Leicestershire  or  any  other  country  ; 
but  merely  to  show  that  he  was  credited  with  an 
ability  which  no  living  man  ever  possessed,  or  ever  will 
possess. 

The  Ouorn,  it  will  be  remembered,  was  the  first 
pack  of  which  Mr.  Smith  was  master,  and  he  was  the 
first  master  of  that  famous  pack  to  hunt  his  own  hounds, 
as  all  previous  masters  had  employed  a  professional 
huntsman.  Whatever  Mr.  Smith's  abilities  as  a  hunts- 
man may  have  been,  it  is  certain  that  no  fence  ever 
stopped  him  in  making  his  cast;  but  as  far  as  can  be 
gathered  from  all  that  has  been  written  about  him,  he 
did  not  care  much  about  slow-hunting  runs.  After  he 
opened  up  the  Tedworth  Woodlands,  a  Hampshire 
farmer  used  to  say  that  old  George  Carter,  his  first 
whipper-in  and  kennel  huntsman,  found  the  foxes  and 
the  Squire  lost  them.  A  clergyman,  who  prefers  to  be 
known  as  "  I.  H.  G.,"  wrote  a  book  about  George  Carter, 


88  THE    QJJORN    HUNT 

who  was  with  Mr.  Smith  for  about  sixteen  years,  and 
hunted  the  hounds  on  certain  days  in  the  week  in 
Hampshire.  In  criticising  his  master,  then  dead,  George 
Carter  is  made  to  speak  thus  : — 

He  would  ride,  for  you  see  he  were  a  wonderful  horseman, 
but  his  ways  and  mine  didn't  always  agree.  I  liked  to  find  a  fox 
and  have  an  hour  and  a  half  with  him  or  more,  and  then  kill  him 
if  I  could,  and  somehow  or  other  I  could  generally  do  that ;  but 
you  see,  sir,  Mr.  Smith  used  to  say,  "  What's  the  good  of  cadd- 
ling  about  after  a  fox  all  day?"  and  if  he  hunted  one  for  forty 
minutes  and  didn't  catch  him,  why  then  he  gave  him  up  and  went 
and  tried  for  another;  and  as  soon  as  he  had  tired  one  horse,  he 
had  another  to  get  on,  and  so  it  didn't  signify ;  but  /  always 
knew  what  Mr.  Smith's  hounds  were.  Why,  then,  I  remember 
one  day  we  met  at  Weyhill ;  Mr.  Smith  came  out  as  a  gentle- 
man, and  I  hunted  the  hounds.  Well,  sir,  we  found  a  fox 
at  Ramridge  .  .  .  and  just  before  we  came  to  Chute  Lodge 
there  were  a  bit  of  plough,  and  I  see  a  hound  called  Nabob 
feathering  up  a  furrow  and  none  o'  the  others  could  own  it ; 
but  I  know'd  he  were  right,  so  I  just  said  quietly,  "  Heic,  Nabob, 
heic." 

"  What  are  you  heicing  for  there  ?  "  says  Mr.  Smith. 

"  I  beg  your  pardon,  sir,"  I  says,  "  but  you  see  Nabob  has 
got  the  line ;  he  can't  speak  to  it  on  the  plough,  but  as  soon  as 
we  get  on  the  grass  they  will  all  open."  And  sure  enough,  sir, 
as  soon  as  we  got  to  the  park  palings,  and  through,  away  they 
went,  and  we  killed  our  fox  after  a  good  hunting  run. 


Such  were  George  Carter's  remarks  ;  but  then  no 
man  is  a  hero  in  the  eyes  of  his  valet. 

On  the  Quorn  country  becoming  vacant,  Mr.  Smith 
decided  to  take  it ;  but  it  is  a  curious  coincidence  that 
neither  in  Sir  J.  Eardley  Wilmot's  book,  nor  in  any 
paper  or  magazine,  is  it  revealed  under  what  circum- 
stances Mr.  Smith  came  to  take  the  country.  In  Nor- 
thamptonshire and  Oxfordshire  he  was  well  enough 
known  :  but  it  is  nowhere  to  be  discovered  what  reason 
prompted   him,  then  without  experience,   to  embark  on 


MR.    ASSHETON    SMITH  89 

the  duties  of  a  M.F.H.  Whether  the  suggestion 
was  made  to  him  that  he  should  take  the  country, 
or  whether  it  was  his  own  idea,  is  a  matter  of  uncer- 
tainty, on  which  a  careful  search  has  failed  to  throw  any 
light. 

However,  be  that  as  it  may,  he  gave  Mr.  Musters  a 
thousand  guineas  for  some  of  his  hounds,  procured  more 
from  Belvoir,  laid  other  kennels  under  contribution,  and 
started  the  season  1806-7  with  plenty  of  hounds  and 
horses.  His  fame  soon  became  noised  abroad,  and  we 
find  that  for  the  first  time  the  Duke  of  Rutland  and  his 
two  brothers,  Lord  Charles  and  Lord  Robert  Manners, 
"honoured"  Mr.  Smith  by  meeting  his  hounds  at  Syston 
in  December  1806,  but  that  was  not  the  last  occasion  on 
which  they  hunted  with  the  Ouorn.  Fair  sport  appears  to 
have  been  enjoyed  on  that  occasion,  and  a  brace  of  foxes 
were  killed,  the  first  at  Syston,  while  the  second,  found 
at  Barkby  Holt,  ran  to  Ashby  Pasture  and  back  to  the 
Holt,  where  he  was  killed.  Then,  on  Monday  the  9th  of 
January  1809,  the  hounds  rolled  over  a  game  fox  after 
a  run  of  an  hour  and  fifty  minutes,  at  the  end  of  which 
all  but  about  half-a-dozen  out  of  a  large  field  were 
fairly  beaten  off.  One  of  the  keenest  hunting  men  in 
the  Ouorn  country  at  this  time  was  a  farrier  named 
Thomas  Varnam,  of  Kibworth,  who  shod  a  great  many 
horses  for  the  Ouorn  men.  He  was  a  fine  horseman, 
and  did  a  good  deal  of  rough  riding  ;  but  in  Mr.  Smith's 
second  season  his  horse  fell  with  him  and  he  was  killed 
on  the  spot. 

In  April  180S  Mr.  Smith  had  a  good  run,  finding  his 
fox  at  Stewart's  Hay  at  two  in  the  afternoon.  Thence 
the  line  lay  by  Martinshaw,  Enderby,  Aylstone  Gorse, 
ultimately  crossing  South  Fields  and  the  New  Walk, 
and  finally,  after  a  run  of  three  hours  and  a  half  (the 
last  seven  miles  without  a  check),  the  fox  took  refuge 
beneath    a    shed    in    the    woodyard    of    Mr.     Harrison, 


9o  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

with  the  hounds  close  at  his  brush.  Mr.  Smith,  who 
appears  to  have  been  the  only  man  up,  dragged  the 
fox  from  his  hiding-place,  and  then  started  off  to  find 
his  whippers-in. 

Some  of  the  runs  chronicled  aforetime  require  a  good 
deal  of  explanation.  Here,  for  instance,  is  one  taken 
from  a  contemporary  publication  in  February  1812.  Mr. 
Smith  found  a  fox  at  Barkby  Holt,  we  are  told,  on  the 
20th  January  in  that  year.  Hounds  "ran  him  hard" 
for  about  an  hour  and  a  half  into  Tilton  Wood,  where, 
when  hounds  were  on  the  point  of  killing  him,  a  fresh 
fox  jumped  up,  and  led  them  to  Edith  Weston,  where 
the  run  came  to  an  end.  Horses  and  hounds  were  so 
knocked  up  that  they  were  left  for  the  night  at  Cottes- 
more. "  From  Barkby  Holt  to  Edith  Weston,"  says  the 
report,  "is  near  thirty  miles."  As  hounds  actually  ran 
that  may  have  been  the  distance  ;  but  in  a  straight  line 
it  is  as  nearly  as  possible  seventeen  miles.  It  could  not 
of  course  have  been  anything  like  straight,  as  hounds  were 
an  hour  and  a  half  in  reaching  Tilton  Wood,  six  miles 
from  Barkby  Holt  "as  the  crow  flies."  From  Tilton 
Wood  to  Edith  Weston  is  a  distance  of  about  twelve 
miles  in  a  straight  line,  but  no  mention  is  made  of  the 
route  taken,  nor  is  the  duration  of  the  whole  run  given. 
This,  however,  is  but  one  of  many  good  runs  which  took 
place  during  the  season  1811-12,  as  on  one  day  four 
horses  are  said  to  have  died  from  over-exertion,  while 
several  others  were  not  expected  to  survive  ;  a  statement 
which,  if  true,  does  not  say  much  for  the  humanity  of 
the  old  school. 

Mr.  Smith's  biography  affords  ample  proof  that  he 
was  accustomed  to  say  funny  things  at  times,  and  what 
would  be  described  in  modern  language  as  given  to 
put  on  "side."  "  He  only  wants  a  rider,"  is  one  of  the 
sayings  put  into  his  mouth  in  reply  to  a  man  who  said 
that  he  had  an  ungovernable  horse.      "  Thank  ye,  but  my 


MR.    ASSHETON    SMITH  91 

left  hand  shall  be  my  martingale,"  is  what  he  is  reported 
to  have  said  to  some  one  who  suggested  that  he  should 
ride  a  particular  horse  in  a  martingale.  A  captain  of 
militia  has  left  it  on  record  that  when  quartered  at 
Loughborough  in  181 2  he  often  went  over  the  kennels 
when  Mr.  Smith  was  away  and  Tom  Wingfield  reigned 
in  his  stead.  The  major  of  the  regiment,  the  story  goes, 
once  had  the  temerity  to  ask  Mr.  Smith  how  he  managed 
to  remember  the  names  of  so  many  hounds.  The  master 
of  the  Quorn  is  stated  to  have  made  the  reply  that  he 
should  consider  himself  a  great  fool  if  he  did  not  know 
every  hound  in  a  strange  pack  after  having  been  out 
with  them  twice,  and  he  added,  "Sir,  I  suppose  that  you 
know  the  name  of  every  man  in  your  regiment."  The 
major  admitted  that  he  did. 

Not  a  little  of  what  has  been  written  about  Mr.  Smith 
must,  I  imagine,  be  taken  with  a  big  pinch  of  salt.  On 
the  day  of  his  great  Belvoir  run  Mr.  White  is  said  to 
have  stuck  in  a  bullfinch,  and  because  he  could  not  get 
out  of  the  way  invited  Mr.  Smith  to  charge  him,  which 
the  master  did,  and  then  the  story  proceeds  to  say  that 
they  went  on  as  if  nothing  had  happened.  Now  if  Mr. 
White,  who  was  pretty  well  as  hard  and  quite  as  heavy 
as  Mr.  Smith,  could  not  make  his  way  through  the  fence, 
it  appears  rather  strange  that  Mr.  Smith  should  be  able 
not  only  to  send  Mr.  White  and  his  horse  flying  into 
the  next  field,  but  to  get  through  himself;  still  more 
wonderful  is  it  that  neither  horse  should  have  fallen, 
for  we  all  know  the  effect  of  a  cannon  out  hunting. 
Some  of  these  miraculous  yarns  may  be  true  ;  but  the 
chances  are  that  many  of  them  are  built  upon  slender 
foundations. 

That  Mr.  Smith  was  somewhat  of  a  jealous  rider  is 
well  known,  and  there  is  a  rather  good  story  told  of  him 
and  Mr.  Maxse.  During  Mr.  Smith's  time,  or  part  of  it, 
it  was  the  fashion  to  have  "  hunter  pairs"  out,  that  is  to 


92  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

say,  a  man  rode  two  greys,  two  chestnuts,  two  bays,  or 
two  roans  in  the  day.  On  one  occasion  Mr.  Maxse  had  two 
blacks  out,  and  finding  his  second  horse,  during  a  good 
run,  just  in  the  nick  of  time,  rode  on  happily.  Mr.  Smith 
not  being  so  fortunate,  and  finding  his  first  horse  quite 
blown,  was  having  some  difficulty  with  a  locked  gate, 
which  Mr.  Maxse,  coming  up  on  a  fresh  horse,  cleared 
easily,  to  the  Squire's  great  disgust,  for  he  had  not  noticed 
that  Mr.  Maxse  had  changed  horses. 

A  statement  that  the  Melton  Hunt  had  become  so 
much  disorganised  towards  the  end  of  the  season  1812-13 
that  Mr.  Charles  Meynell  had  seceded  from  it,  had  its 
origin  in  a  difficulty  about  subscriptions,  a  point  on  which 
Mr.  Smith  himself,  most  punctilious  in  money  matters, 
was  very  particular  ;  yet  on  the  whole,  thanks  chiefly  to 
Mr.  Moore,  the  Ouorn  Hunt  did  their  duty  by  the 
master,  as  nearly  ^"3000  per  annum  is  said  to  have  been 
forthcoming  from  the  Melton  side  alone,  while  on  one 
occasion  the  amount  almost  reached  ^3600.  In  18 14 
Mr.  Musters  gave  up  his  Nottinghamshire  country,  and 
on  Qoino-  to  the  Badsworth  aofain  sold  some  hounds  to 
Mr.  Smith,  who  had  a  great  liking  for  the  strain  ;  he 
weeded  out  his  pack,  and  on  starting  cub-hunting  showed 
the  best  of  sport,  any  number  of  good  runs  taking  place 
on  the  forest. 

About  this  time  Sir  Francis  Burdett  was  in  great 
form  with  the  Ouorn,  and,  as  some  one  said  of  him, 
"  he  dashes  with  as  much  gallantry  after  the  hounds  as 
in  the  political  field — although  in  the  latter  we  find  him 
sometimes  alone,  with  the  former  he  generally  leads  a 
considerable  majority." 

The  Marquis  of  Tavistock  gave  up  his  hounds  (the 
Oakley)  in  181 5,  and  took  a  hunting-box  at  Ouorndon, 
to  hunt  with  Mr.  Smith.  Among  other  well-known 
followers  of  the  Ouorn  at  the  time  was  Mr.  Tom  Hey- 
cock,  who  was  intimately  connected  with  the   "  four  M 


MR.    ASSHETON    SMITH  93 

era  of  Melton.  His  memory  was  remarkably  tenacious, 
and  when  he  was  once  started  on  his  favourite  subject  of 
the  men  with  whom  he  had  ridden  side  by  side  over 
Leicestershire,  there  was,  a  contemporary  of  his  once 
said,  "no  holding  him."  He  was  a  brilliant  horseman, 
and  nothing  pleased  Sir  James  Musgrave,  himself  a 
bold  rider,  better  than  to  give  him  a  mount  on  a  horse 
which  had  never  been  over  a  fence,  without  telling  him 
the  horse's  antecedents. 

Tom  Heycock  was  an  excellent  sportsman,  and  for  a 
time  Mr.  Smith  was  friendly  enough  with  him  ;  but  here 
is  an  incident  related  by  a  frequenter  of  the  Ouorn  at 
the  time  : — 

Nothing  pleased  Tom  more  than  to  tell  how  Sir  James  Mus- 
grave challenged  him  to  show  the  field  how  "  the  thing  ought  to 
be  done  "  at  a  long  check  near  a  very  awkward  brook,  which  there 
was  no  chance  of  jumping,  when  a  hard  rider  had  shown  them 
very  decisively  "  how  it  ought  not  to  be  done."  He  began  with 
"  the  Pony,"  and  Mr.  Assheton  Smith,  who  had  been  very  civil  to 
him  up  to  that  point,  was  terribly  annoyed  by  his  taking  one  of 
his  "  sensation  jumps  "  over  a  gate  close  in  his  wake.  The  great 
maestro  was  wont  to  do  these  things  to  get  cheered,  and  was  so 
cross  at  having  to  divide  the  applause  this  time,  that  he  never 
spoke  to  Tom  again  except  with  a  growl,  and  took  no  earthly 
notice  of  him  at  the  great  Rolleston  meet  of  1840.  This  was 
when  he  left  Tedworth  for  a  time  to  pay  a  visit  with  his 
hounds  to  Leicestershire  and  Lincolnshire,  which  is  mentioned 
on  another  page. 

Some  ground  for  believing  that  Mr.  Smith  occa- 
sionally rode  to  the  "gallery"  is  afforded  by  a  passage 
in  his  Life : — 

An  instance  of  one  of  his  diagonal  leaps  is  thus  recorded  :  The 
hounds,  coming  in  the  course  of  a  run  to  an  immensely  high  and 
steep  bank,  with  a  stile  on  the  top  of  it,  many  gentlemen  did  not 
like  its  looks.  Mr.  Smith,  throwing  his  whip  into  his  left  hand, 
and  at  the  same  time  taking  out  his  pocket-handkerchief  (this  was 
done  by  way  of  giving  the  thing  an  air  of  negligence),  said,  "  So 


94  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

you  won't  have  it,  gentlemen  ?  "  Then,  taking  the  fence  diagonally, 
"  he,  by  his  peculiarly  light  hand,  made  his  horse  take  the  fence  in 
this  way — first  on  the  bank,  then  over  the  stile  and  down  on  the 
other  side.  Nobody  else  could  take  the  fence  in  the  same  manner 
or  would  attempt  it  in  any  other." 

If,  however,  there  was  a  little  flashiness  about  Mr.  Smith's 
riding,  there  is  no  doubt  of  the  courage  he  ever  exhibited  in  the 
saddle.  On  one  occasion,  after  a  long  hunt,  his  hounds  ran  from 
scent  to  view,  the  fox  making  for  a  rickyard  on  the  outskirts  of  a 
village,  a  crowd  quickly  collecting.  Mr.  Smith,  galloping  down  a 
big  grass  field,  charged  a  six-barred  white  gate  into  a  narrow  lane, 
and  then,  with  hardly  enough  space  in  which  to  collect  his  horse, 
jumped  another  gate  out  of  the  lane.  A  countryman,  who  was 
about  to  open  the  second  gate,  remarked  :  "  What's  the  use  of 
opening  gates  for  a  flying  ossman  ?  " 


Mr.  Heycock  died  in  1863.  At  a  somewhat  ad- 
vanced age,  a  bad  attack  of  jaundice  overtook  him. 
On  partially  recovering,  he  was  sent  to  Leamington  to 
recruit  his  health  ;  but  to  no  purpose.  He  lived,  until 
he  removed  to  Braunston,  about  three  miles  from  Oak- 
ham, almost  entirely  at  his  farm  at  Owston.  The  fre- 
quenters of  Tattersall's  hardly  knew  him  by  sight,  and 
the  ring  he  liked  best  was  an  agricultural  show  one, 
with  the  hunter  colts  inside  it.  Over  the  Owston  farm 
he  schooled  a  number  of  hunters,  and  generally  had  on 
hand  something  with  which  Sir  James  Musgrave  or 
some  other  shining  light  of  Melton  could  do  nothing. 
Sir  Harry  Goodricke's  famous  horse,  Dr.  Russell, 
baffled  all  the  thrusters  and  breakers  in  the  neigh- 
bourhood ;  but  after  a  time  Tom  Heycock  made  him 
go  quietly,  and  taught  him  to  gallop,  for  this  does 
not  come  by  nature  to  all  horses. 

Shortly  before  Mr.  Smith  left  Leicestershire,  that 
is  to  say,  in  the  year  18 15,  there  appeared  at  Melton 
a  well-known  hunting  man,  Captain  White — "  Leicester- 
shire White,"  as  he  was  called — who  looked  over  Joe 
Maiden's   son    "  to  see   if  he  had  good  legs  and  feet." 


MR.    ASSHETON    SMITH  95 

Joe  Maiden  himself  had  a  false  leg,  his  own  having 
been  amputated.  Captain  White  and  Mr.  Maxse  kept 
house  together,  their  dwelling  receiving  the  name  of 
Claret  Lodge  from  the  amount  of  wine  they  got  through. 
Captain  White  is  mentioned  in  "Nimrod's"  Quarterly 
Review  run,  and  there  is  an  engraving  of  him  jumping 
a  gate,  which  "  Snob  "  is  attempting  to  open.  He  hunted 
from  Melton,  and  then  in  1842  took  his  leave  of  that 
place,  where  he  was  regarded  as  the  last  of  the  Mohi- 
cans, and  became  master  of  the  Cheshire  hounds,  which 
he  hunted  for  twelve  seasons.  During  his  early  days, 
while  staying  at  Melton,  he  went  out  to  meet  Lord 
Lonsdale's  hounds,  and  took  part  in  two  capital  runs, 
one  of  forty  minutes  and  the  other  of  an  hour  and  ten 
minutes,  the  fox  being  killed  in  each  instance.  Captain 
White  finished  his  day  twenty-four  miles  from  Melton, 
and  after  riding  leisurely  thither,  he  had  a  chop  and  a 
cup  of  tea,  and  then  proceeded  to  ride  to  his  residence, 
Park  Hall,  Derbyshire,  a  great  many  miles  distant ; 
he  crossed  the  Peak  of  Derbyshire  in  a  violent  snow- 
storm, reaching  home  about  midnight.  Captain  White, 
by  the  way,  was  known  as  the  "  Light  Manchester," 
while  his  chum,  Mr.  Maxse,  was  called  the  "  Heavy 
Bristol." 

In  April  18 16  we  find  Mr.  Smith  writing  a  courteous 
letter  to  Mr.  Cradock  in  connection  with  his  coverts  about 
Gumley.  The  master  points  out  that  it  is  the  only  place 
upon  which  they  have  to  depend  in  the  district,  and  that, 
though  he  knows  it  is  Mr.  Cradock's  wish  that  foxes 
should  be  preserved,  he  states  that  he  had  been  unlucky 
in  not  finding  them  in  the  coverts. 

Mr.  Smith  was  then  drawing  near  the  end  of  his 
period  of  mastership  ;  but  just  as  we  hear  nothing  of 
how  he  came  to  take  the  Quorn  country,  so  we  learn 
nothing  as  to  the  reasons  which  caused  him  to  resign, 
and,  strange  as  it  may  seem,  the  very  date  of  his  retire- 


96  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

ment  does  not  appear  to  be  a  matter  of  certainty.  Sir 
John  Eardley  Wilmot,  in  his  "Life  of  Mr.  Smith,"  makes 
the  latter  go  to  the  Burton  country  in  1816;  but  Mrs. 
Musters,  in  "  Hunting  Songs  and  Sport,"  gives  the 
period  of  Mr.  Smith's  mastership  of  the  Ouorn  as  from 
1806  to  1 8 17,  and  these  are  doubtless  the  correct  dates. 
Confirmation  of  this  opinion  is  afforded  by  the  Stamford 
Mercury  for  the  25th  July  18 17,  wherein  it  is  stated  that 
Mr.  Walker  was  about  to  vacate  the  Burton  country  and 
would  be  succeeded  by  Mr.  Smith,  "under  the  immediate 
patronage  of  the  Monson  family,"  while  in  the  issue  of 
the  same  paper  for  1st  August  18 17  is  a  paragraph  to 
the  effect  that  it  was  "expected"  that  Mr.  Osbaldeston 
would  hunt  Leicestershire,  as  he  was  in  treaty  with  Mr. 
Smith  for  the  purchase  of  Quorndon  Hall.  This,  perhaps, 
may  be  taken  as  settling  the  question  of  dates.  Lei- 
cestershire, as  a  whole,  regretted  Mr.  Smith's  departure, 
for,  though  he  was  hasty  in  temper,  and  at  times  some- 
what overbearing,  he  hunted  the  country  with  zeal,  kept 
up  a  capital  pack  of  hounds,  mounted  his  men  well,  showed 
excellent  sport,  and  gave  his  subscribers  good  value  for 
their  money. 

Mr.  Smith,  as  is  well  known,  was  a  good  cricketer, 
an  ardent  yachtsman,  and  in  his  earlier  days  a  good  shot, 
but  after  his  younger  life  he  scarcely  ever  handled  a  gun. 
Mr.  Smith  died  in  1858,  at  the  age  of  eighty-two.  •  It  had 
always  been  his  ambition  to  hunt  his  own  hounds  at  the 
age  of  eighty,  but  this  was  denied  him. 

During  Mr.  Smith's  mastership  of  the  Ouorn  the 
Rev.  Dr.  Ford,  for  forty-five  years  vicar  of  Melton 
Mowbray,  and  of  whom  mention  is  made  elsewhere, 
wrote  a  poem  called  "The  Melton  Hunt,"  which  was 
composed  about  the  year  1S13.  Mr.  Ferneley  the  artist 
found  a  copy  of  the  verses  among  some  old  papers,  and 
gave  them  to  Mr.  Smith's  biographer.  The  poem  is  as 
follows  ; — ■ 


MR.    ASSHETON    SMITH  97 


THE    MELTON    HUNT,   1813 

"  I  must  have  liberty 
Withal,  as  large  a  charter  as  the  wind, 
To  blow  on  whom  I  please  ;  for  so  fools  have, 
And  they  that  are  most  galled  with  my  folly, 
They  most  must  laugh."— Shakspeare. 

I  sing  Fox-hunting,  and  the  gen'rous  rage 

Which  spurs  the  noble  youth  of  this  new  age, 

With  careless  toil,  all  for  their  country's  good, 

To  rid  us  of  those  vermin  of  the  wood 

That  nightly  steal,  and  for  their  luncheon  hoard 

The  poultry  which  should  smoke  upon  our  board. 

Such  feats  advent'rous  through  the  hard-run  day, 

From  dull  November  to  all  charming  May, 

Call  for  the  poet's  best  and  readiest  rhyme 

In  strains  at  once  familiar  and  sublime. 

Oh  !  could  my  muse  resemble  such  a  chase, 

And  with  the  riders  keep  an  equal  pace, 

Though  cautious,  bold ;  cool,  yet  with  ardour  fired  ; 

Free,  without  check  ;  impetuous,  yet  untired. 

Ye  knowing  sportsmen,  foremost  of  the  lead, 
Who  keep  no  turnpike,  and  no  fences  heed ; 
Who  crack  the  echoing  whip,  go  off  in  style, 
Enjoy  the  sport,  and  pace  through  every  wile- 
Now  found,  now  lost,  and  now  again  in  view — 
The  cunning  fugitive  ye  close  pursue  : 
Ye  booted  senators,  who  for  me  frank, 
Claiming  post  after  post  an  unpaid  thank; 
Who,  with  yourselves,  bring  thousands  yearly  down 
To  glut  the  cravings  of  this  sharp-set  town, 
Whose  trickful  tradesmen,  farmers,  rogues  in  grain, 
Thrive  by  your  wants,  and  by  your  losses  gain, 
Scramble  who  most  at  sight  your  bills  shall  share, — 
"  Take  in  a  hunter,"  and  the  booty's  fair : 
Be  candid,  hunters,  if,  once  famed  in  Greek, 
Faintly  your  foreign  dialect  I  speak, 
Up  to  your  phrases  if  I'm  found  unable, 
Not  tutored  in  the  science  of  your  stable. 
Besides,  our  tribe,  you  know,  scarce  hunt  at  all, 
Save  for  preferment,  and  the  well-cribbed  stall; 


98  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

Yet  by  your  partial  notice  made  thus  rich, 
Raised  by  your  favours  to  my  honour's  pitch, 
I'll  try  to  set  the  table  whilst  you  quaff, 
If  not  on  roar,  on  a  facetious  laugh, 
Whilst  spice  of  Latin  shall  with  harmless  jest, 
Like  poignant  Cayenne,  give  my  olio  zest. 


Not  as  their  fathers  erst  "  with  early  horn," 

Our  modern  hunters  now  "salute  the  morn," 

'Tis  noon,  ere  these  in  scarlet  bright  array 

Commence  th'  achievements  of  the  dubious  day, 

Each  on  his  steed,  sleek-coated  and  high  fed, 

From  sire  to  dam  in  calendar  well  bred ; 

For  in  the  jockey's  heraldry  the  stud 

Must  boast  descent  from  ancestry  of  blood  ; 

As  well  you  might  a  hobby-horse  bestride, 

As  mount  a  roadster  of  no  lineal  pride. 

Here  blacks,  browns,  bays,  and  chestnuts,  most  renowned 

For  spirit,  temper,  shape,  price,  fill  the  ground  ; 

Each  brags  his  favourite  prowess  in  the  field, 

"  My  grey  mare  to  no  better  horse  shall  yield; " 

But  Forester's  fine  eye  and  single  glance 

Finds  out  the  latent  blemish  as  they  prance ; 

Deep  skilled  to  scan  the  solid  worth  that  lies 

In  horses,  men,  and  their  true  qualities. 

Hear  him  but  talk,  what  music  on  his  tongue ! 

It  cheers  the  old,  it  fascinates  the  young : 

Look  in  his  face,  no  doubt  the  counterpart, 

The  honest,  liberal  sentiment  of  heart. 

Hark  forward  how  they  bear ;  nor  them  restrains, 

Or  driving  blast,  or  storm  with  drenching  rains. 

What  springs  they  make,  o'er  ditches,  post,  and  rail, 

And  dash  and  plunge  through  Belvoir's  stick-fast  vale  ! 

In  at  the  death  'tis  glorious  to  arrive ; 

To  claim  the  brush,  no  mean  prerogative : 

Thrown  out,  and  some  thrown  off,  besplashed  with  mire, 

A  motley  group — peer — parson — grazier — squire. 

Home  safe  returned,  how  changed  !  studious  they  dress, 
In  newest  fashion  for  the  sumptuous  mess; 
Set  out  with  Lucry's  complete  bill  of  fare  : 
Fish  by  the  mail — delicious,  costly,  rare ; 
High-seasoned  dishes, — fricassees — ragout, 
All  that  the  sav'ry  pamp'ring  art  can  do. 


MR.    ASSHETON    SMITH  99 

They  eat  like  hunters,  frequent  bumpers  drain, 

Of  flavoured  claret  and  of  brisk  champagne. 

Flushed  with  the  grape,  like  Persia's  prince  grown  vain, 

They  thrice  each  bullfinch  charge,  and  thrice  "they  slay  the  slain  " 

Where  Smith  would  draw,  what  lengths  with  freshmen  go, 

To  break  them  into  service  passing  show ! 


"Saddle  White  Surrey  for  the  field  to-morrow." 

But  ah  !  unlooked  for,  to  their  spleen  and  sorrow, 

The  next  day  "  comes  a  frost,  a  killing  frost," 

All's  at  a  stand,  and  all  their  pleasure  crossed. 

To  town  some  scamper,  and  the  odds  are  even, 

Who  first  get  seats  in  Chapel  of  St.  Stephen, 

To  do  their  duty  there,  State  flaws  detect, 

Invent  new  laws,  and  trespasses  correct ; 

The  frost  now  gone,  they're  down  again  in  mind, 

And  motion  quicker  than  the  verging  wind. 

To  sober  whist,  some  soberly  betake, 

Though  deep  the  rubber,  deeper  yet  the  stake, 

Fixed  as  stanch  pointers  to  a  practised  set, 

Well  read  in  Hoyle,  on  every  deal  who  bet ; 

And  cards  played  out,  what  a  confused  din 

Of  blame,  or  praise,  as  the  sets  lose  or  win  ! 

"  You  played  the  Knave,  you  might  have  played  the  Deuce." 

"You  drew  and  forced  my  Queen." — "Pray,  spare  abuse."- 

"You  cut  my  hand  to  pieces,  threw  away 

Your  highest  diamond,  and  you  call  this  Play  ?  " — 

"  There  a  cool  fifty  goes  !     Before  we  part, 

Take  my  advice,  get  Bob  Short's  rules  by  heart." 

So  oft  began  the  midnight  conversation, 

So  closed  as  oft  in  mutual  altercation. 


But  now  a  scene  how  brilliant  hath  ta'en  place, 

Where  beauty,  elegance,  and  softest  grace, 

Of  highest  female  rank — resistless  can 

Charm  and  control  that  lawless  creature,  man; 

Improve  his  morals,  harmonise  his  heart, 

And  tenderness  to  fortitude  impart ! 

School  of  Politeness,  be  our  club  hence  named, 

For  kindest  conjugal  attention  famed, 

Each  well  deserving  that  pure  bliss  of  life, 

The  sweet  endearments  of  a  lovely  wife; 

Be  Benedict  of  Beatrice  possessed, 


IOO 


THE    QUORN    HUNT 


Like  Cavendish,  Powlett,  Worcester,  Plymouth  blessed, 

Like  Forester 

I  leave  a  lengthened  space 

Where  bachelors  forlorn  may  find  a  place  ; 
Aylesford  and  Dartmouth,  gallant  Craven,  May, 
All-polished  Mayler,  and  Sir  Robert  Gay. 

This  round  of  labour  ruddy  health  insures, 

To  courage  stirs,  to  hardiness  inures ; 

Thus  trained,  my  masters,  you  would  meet  the  foe, 

Furious  to  battle,  as  to  covert  go. 

A  cavalry  already  formed  the  French  to  rout, 

And  Tally-ho  !  your  frantic  war-whoop,  shout, 

But  hold  !  our  furrows  in  the  blade  look  green, 

Our  burdened  ewes  their  tender  lambs  'gin  yean  ; 

Timely  you  cease,  of  damages  afraid, 

Nor  injure  lands  for  summer  crops  new  laid, 

Pastures  revive — foxes  shall  breed  and  rear, 

Strong  and  inviting  cubs  for  next  Leap  Year. — Shallow. 


fi    2? 


CHAPTER    IV 

MR.    GEORGE    OSBALDESTON    (1817-1821,   1823-1827) 
SIR    BELLINGHAM    GRAHAM    (1821-1823) 
LORD    SOUTHAMPTON    (1827-1831) 


CHAPTER    IV 

MR.   GEORGE   OSBALDESTON 

1817-1821,  1823-1827 

MR.  OSBALDESTON,  like  his  predecessor,  to 
whom  he  was  eleven  years  junior  in  age,  was 
born  in  London  (Wimpole  Street)  on  Boxing  Day, 
1787,  and  after  some  experience  with  harriers,  which 
occasionally  ran  foxes,  in  1809  or  18 10  became  master 
of  the  Burton  country,  buying  the  hounds  of  the  fourth 
Lord  Monson.  In  18 14  he  migrated  to  the  South  Notts 
district,  and  after  admitting  that  it  was  a  most  difficult 
country  in  which  to  kill  foxes,  left  at  the  end  of  his  first 
season  to  take  the  Atherstone  country,  of  which  he  may 
be  said  to  have  been  the  first  master,  for  then  it  was 
that  the  Atherstone  became  a  really  separate  hunt. 
After  two  years  there  he  succeeded  Mr.  Assheton  Smith 
at  Ouorndon  as  the  sixth  master  of  the  Ouorn. 

Mr.  Osbaldeston  came  to  Quorn  with  a  great 
reputation  for  hound-breeding  skill,  horsemanship,  and 
keenness  in  general,  and  the  reputation  was  by  no 
means  undeserved.  One  who  saw  his  hounds  durino- 
his  first  mastership  wrote  that  they  were  a  very  perfect 
pack — all  of  one  size,  of  one  colour,  of  the  same  form 
and  general  character,  and  showed  more  blood  than  any 
other  hounds,  while  they  appeared  to  be  less  than  their 
real  height  ;  the  last  mentioned  being,  of  course,  a 
compliment  to  their  symmetry.  Somehow  or  other, 
however,  Mr.   Osbaldeston  could  not  manage  to  please 


103 


io4  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

everybody,  and  there  were  certainly  two  opinions  about 
his  character  as  a  huntsman — 

Who  is  the  trumpeter  blowing  his  horn  ? 
That  is  the  trumpeter  coming  from  Quorn, 
The  very  worst  huntsman  that  ever  was  born, 

are  lines  which  were  applied  to  Mr.  Osbaldeston  as  a 
huntsman,  while  Mr.  Grantley  Berkeley  in  his  published 
works  refers  to  the  Squire *  in  anything  but  compli- 
mentary terms.  In  the  year  1865,  long  of  course  after 
Mr.  Osbaldeston  had  given  up  hunting,  there  appeared 
in  print  a  review  of  a  book  of  Mr.  Grantley  Berkeley's 
and  also  a  letter  in  which  reflections  were  cast  upon  his 
system,  and  to  these  Mr.  Osbaldeston  replied  in  the 
following  words  : — 

Now,  sir,  I  hunted  the  Burton  country  in  Lincolnshire  ;  the 
Spilsbyin  Lincolnshire;  Mr.  Musters's  in  Nottinghamshire;  Lord 
Vernon's  in  Derbyshire ;  the  Atherstone ;  the  Holderness  in 
Yorkshire;  the  Suffolk,  the  Quorn,  the  Pytchley  and  Hampshire, 
a  period  of  more  than  thirty-five  years  ;  and,  during  that  long 
career,  I  never  heard  any  complaints  conveyed  through  any  of 
my  friends,  and  I  hunted  the  hounds  myself  and  bred  them 
myself.  When  1  left  the  Burton  country  I  was  presented  with 
a  large  silver  waiter,  the  handles  being  in  imitation  of  two  foxes' 
heads,  with  an  inscription  expressive  of  their  approbation  of  my 
hunting  the  country  ;  and  when  I  left  the  Pytchley  I  received  a 
beautiful  snuff-box  from  the  Hunt  with  the  following  inscription  : 
"To  the  best  sportsman  of  any  age  or  country." 

Mr.  Osbaldeston  was  saved  the  trouble  of  finding  a 
fresh  pack  of  hounds  when  he  took  the  Quorn  country, 
as  he  brought  his  own  with  him  from  the  Atherstone, 
and  they  quickly  took  the  eye  of  the  Quorn  men.  A 
good  many  people  had  complimentary  things  to  say  of 

1  Mr.  Osbaldeston  was  called  the  Squire  because  he  was  the  only  com- 
moner who  then  hunted  a  pack  of  hounds  in  Leicestershire,  and  he  was 
very  proud  of  the  title. 


MR.    GEORGE    OSBALDESTON  105 

their  make  and  shape,  and  their  hunting  powers  ;  but  the 
greatest  compliment  of  all  was  when  one  who  was  often 
with  them  said  that  they  did  not  in  the  least  appear  to 
mind  being  ridden  over,  or  to  be  mixed  up  with  the  field, 
to  which  they  appeared  accustomed. 

The  fact  appears  to  be  that  both  the  Squire  and  his 
hounds  came  to  see  that  Leicestershire  required  a  style 
which  materially  differed  from  that  which  would  suffice 
elsewhere.  From  all  accounts  the  Osbaldeston  of  Not- 
tinghamshire, Lincolnshire,  and  the  Atherstone  country 
was  not  the  Osbaldeston  of  Leicestershire.  On  coming 
to  the  Quorn  he  found  that  he  had  to  conform  to  the 
peculiarities  of  the  country,  and  he  wisely  adapted  him- 
self to  circumstances  ;  yet  even  in  his  most  rapid  move- 
ments he  always  showed  himself  perfectly  cognisant  of 
what  he  intended  to  effect,  and  how  to  accomplish  it. 
Those  who  knew  him  in  countries  other  than  the  Quorn 
averred  that  as  a  huntsman  he  was  patient,  and  most 
averse  to  interfering  with  the  pack  until  they  had  quite 
failed  to  solve  any  difficulty  which  might  have  presented 
itself.  "  Often  and  often,"  writes  one  who  constantly 
followed  his  hounds,  "have  I  seen  him  grind  his  teeth 
in  vexation,  and  heard  him  utter  an  anathema  when  his 
favourites  were  interdicted  from  feeling  for  the  line  by 
the  continuous  charge  of  a  body  of  men  whose  one 
solitary  idea  was  to  follow  a  leader  without  other  care 
or  thought." 

Mr.  Grantley  Berkeley  possibly  called  him  "flashy" 
because  he  was  quick.  He  soon  discovered  that  a  good 
start  was,  if  not  everything,  at  least  worth  a  good  deal, 
and  in  this  particular  he  was  said  to  soon  be  a  match  for 
any  of  his  followers.  Having  undertaken  to  hunt  the 
Quorn  country  six  days  a  week  he  had,  of  course,  to 
strengthen  his  kennel,  and  towards  this  end  he  procured 
a  large  draft  from  Belvoir,  the  famous  hound  Furrier, 
then  very  young,  being  among  the  lot.     The  story  has 


106  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

often  been  told  how  Furrier  was  crooked  owing  to 
having  been  tied  up  too  much  at  walk,  and  this  was  no 
doubt  the  reason  of  his  being  sent  away  from  Belvoir. 
When  any  critic  came  to  the  kennels,  and  tried  to  obtain 
an  end-on  view  of  Furrier,  the  Squire  would  interpose 
and  say  in  his  shrill  voice,  "Not  that  way  ;  look  at  him 
so,"  and  Furrier  would  be  turned  broadside  on,  so  that 
his  shortcoming  should  not  be  seen. 

At  the  end  of  a  very  long  day,  when  hounds  and 
horses  were  pretty  well  beaten,  the  indomitable  Furrier 
was  running  at  the  head  of  the  pack,  and  in  his  career 
jumped  a  very  high  gate,  and  from  that  moment  he 
became  a  stud-hound.  At  first  he  was  naturally  used 
with  care  ;  but  he  was  not  long  in  making  a  name  for 
himself,  and  before  the  Squire's  second  period  of  master- 
ship came  to  an  end  he  rode  up  to  Kirby  gate  on  the 
first  Monday  in  November  with  twenty  (one  account 
says  forty)  couples  of  bitches,  all  by  Furrier,  and  in  an 
ecstasy  of  pleasure  the  master  said,  "  There,  gentlemen, 
there  they  are.  I  have  bred  those  beauties  to  please 
you — ride  over  them  if  you  can."  * 

This  was  perhaps  a  rather  injudicious  challenge  to 
issue,  but  as  a  matter  of  fact  the  hounds  were  not  so 
much  ridden  over  as  those  of  some  other  masters  of  the 
Ouorn.  Mr.  Osbaldeston  made  no  pretence  of  stopping 
his  field  by  a  single  wave  of  his  hand  as  Mr.  Greene  did 
afterwards  ;  but  some  of  his  pet  anathemas,  given  in  his 
loudest  and  shrillest  falsetto,  usually  sufficed  to  secure 
elbow-room  for  his  hounds. 

Although  these  hounds  were  all  that  could  be  desired 
in  point  of  make  and  shape — their  necks,  shoulders,  loins, 
and  limbs  are  said  to  have  been  as  near  perfection  as 

1  Durin0-  the  time  that  Mr.  Villebois  was  master  of  the  Hampshire 
Hounds,  he  met  on  the  22nd  December  1822  at  Harmsworth,  and  on  that 
occasion  he  took  to  the  covert-side  sixteen  and  a  half  couples  of  hounds  by 
Pontiff,  a  favourite  stallion  hound  of  his,  the  dams  being  Vengeance, 
Thoughtless,  Notable,  and  Milliner. 


MR.    GEORGE    OSBALDESTON  107 

possible — there  was  one  famous  hound  at  Quorn  called 
Vaulter,  which  was  walked  by  one  of  the  Squire's  tenants 
in  Yorkshire,  and  when  he  was  sent  in  a  note  came  with 
him  to  say  that  he  should  make  a  good  hound,  as  he  had 
eaten  the  mistress's  prayer-book.  Mr.  Osbaldeston's 
packs,  however,  had  two  faults,  and  in  pointing  them  out 
Mr.  Grantley  Berkeley  was  right — they  ran  quite  mute, 
and  were  impatient  on  a  middling  scent.  Their  muteness 
was  ascribed  to  the  strain  of  Sir  Thomas  Mostyn  (who 
hunted  what  is  now  the  Bicester  country),  Furrier  being 
by  one  of  his  stud-hounds  which  never  threw  his  tongue  ; 
indeed,  all  Sir  Thomas  Mostyn's  hounds  were  notoriously 
mute.  Their  impatience  on  a  poor  scent  is  said  to  have 
been  engendered  by  the  impetuosity  of  the  field  which 
followed  them.  Nevertheless,  the  Furrier  pack  were 
bred  by  Mr.  Osbaldeston  to  answer  a  particular  purpose, 
and  they  answered  it  ;  if  they  went  away  from  covert 
with  anything  like  a  scent  and  on  decent  terms  with  their 
fox,  they  showed  the  best  of  sport.  Such  is  contem- 
poraneous criticism,  though  perhaps  there  is  no  pack  in 
the  United  Kingdom  which  would  not  run  under  similar 
conditions. 

It  is  well  known,  however,  that  Mr.  Osbaldeston 
spent  much  of  his  time  in  kennel,  and  report  says  that  his 
hounds  were  under  such  control  as  would  almost  have 
satisfied  the  authorities  in  these  dog-muzzling  days  ( 1 898). 

It  has  been  said  that  the  words,  "  Bitches  turn  over," 
sufficed  to  make  the  two  sexes  go  apart  ;  but  too  much 
credence  need  not  be  placed  on  the  anecdote,  since  it 
has  been  told  of  three  or  four  kennels,  while,  to  make  the 
story  perfect,  the  dogs  should  at  least  have  been  as  well 
versed  in  English  as  the  ladies  of  the  kennel. 

The  Squire  thoroughly  threw  his  back  into  hunting 
the  Quorn  country,  and  he  showed  much  excellent  sport. 
Hunting  six  days  a  week,  however,  made  a  strain  upon 
Mr.  Osbaldeston's  resources,  and  it  was  not  long  before 


108  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

he  stipulated  for  an  increased  subscription,  which  was 
granted  him,  and  the  season  1819-20  began  in  tolerably 
brilliant  fashion.  On  the  opening  day  at  Kirby  Gate  in 
1 81 9,  three  very  decent  runs  fell  to  the  lot  of  the  hounds, 
and  on  subsequent  days  the  sport  was  good.  Mr. 
Osbaldeston,  being  a  country  gentleman  bred  and  born 
(his  property  was  in  Yorkshire),  was  quite  in  touch  with 
the  farmers,  who  at  that  time  preserved  foxes  well  for 
him,  whereas  formerly  they  had  "  crabbed  these  gentle- 
men fox-hunters."  The  Squire,  too,  whatever  his  later 
failings  may  have  been,  bought  all  his  oats,  hay,  and 
other  things  from  the  farmers,  so  the  latter  soon  came 
to  see  that  hunting,  even  if  productive  of  some  damage, 
was  not  without  its  better  side.  The  country  people, 
too,  were  taken  by  the  Squire's  zeal  and  interest  in 
them  ;  for,  instead  of  hunting  the  fox  with  their  own 
sheep  and  other  dogs,  they  kept  them  carefully  tied  up 
when  hounds  were  about. 

Excellent  as  was  the  sport  shown  by  Mr.  Osbal- 
deston, some  of  the  runs  must  have  been  grossly  exag- 
gerated. We  read,  for  example,  of  a  run  which  began  at 
Marriott's  Gorse,  from  which  a  fox  slipped  away  as  soon 
as  he  heard  hounds  coming.  The  Squire,  however,  soon 
hit  off  his  line,  and  after  running  a  ring  back  to  where  he 
was  found,  was  forced  out  again,  and  gave  a  run  of  an 
hour  and  seven  minutes,  during  which  twenty  miles  are 
said  to  have  been  covered !  Well  may  we  say  with 
Dominie  Sampson,  "Prodigious!"  The  fox  in  question 
went  to  ground,  and  I  find  a  note  to  the  effect  that, 
as  foxes  were  becoming  rather  scarce,  it  was  deemed 
prudent  to  dig  out  this  one  and  "  reserve  him  for 
another  day's  sport." 

During  Mr.  Osbaldeston's  tenure  of  mastership  some 
of  his  best  known  followers  were  Lord  Plymouth,  who, 
living  with  his  family  at  Melton  Lodge,  kept  up  a 
remarkably  fine  stable  of  hunters.     He  seldom  had  fewer 


MR.    GEORGE    OSBALDESTON  109 

than  twenty  horses,  and  he  would  pay,  it  is  said,  as  much 
as  ,£1000 — he  certainly  bought  several  at  ^500  and  ,£600 
each — and  then  when  he  had  bought  these  costly  steeds 
he  discovered  that  he  could  not  ride  some  of  them  ;  he 
would,  therefore,  put  up  Dick  Christian,  so  that  he  might 
have  the  satisfaction  of  seeing  them  go.  Sir  James 
Musgrave,  of  course,  was  a  standing  dish,  and  "  Paddy  " 
Maher  was  one  of  the  shining  lights  of  Melton,  he  pos- 
sessing a  thorough  knowledge  of  everything  pertaining 
to  hounds,  horses,  and  hunting.  No  coffee-houser  was 
he.  As  soon  as  hounds  were  in  covert  he  was  all  atten- 
tion ;  on  a  good  start  he  placed  his  whole  hope,  and  if 
he  only  slipped  well  away,  no  hounds  could  shake  him 
off.  If  he  were  left  behind,  as  the  best  of  men  are  some- 
times, he  would  just  dodge  along  the  roads  and  lanes  at 
a  trot ;  but  never  could  he  be  induced  to  ride  a  stern 
chase.  He  is  said  to  have  ridden  horses  which  were 
somewhat  deficient  in  blood,  and  though  they  could  all 
jump  like  cats,  could  not  catch  up  hounds.  There  is  a 
story  that  on  one  occasion  Mr.  Valentine  Maher,  while 
riding  one  of  his  "countrymen" — he  had  several  Irish 
horses — crept  behind  a  haystack  so  that  people  should 
not  see  that  his  horse  was  beaten.  One  of  the  best  of 
his  stud,  however,  was  a  grey  Irish  horse  named  Erin, 
which  stood  barely  fifteen  hands  one  inch.  Mr.  Assheton 
Smith,  who  had  ridden  him  a  few  times,  pronounced 
him  to  be  "the  stoutest  horse  then  in  Leicestershire." 
Of  Erin's  jumping  powers  "Paddy"  Maher  once  had 
ample  proof.  Maher,  who  was  very  strong  in  the  arms, 
rode  all  his  horses  in  snaffle  bridles,  which,  as  an  autho- 
rity has  reminded  us,  is  not  the  same  thing  as  riding  a 
snaffle-bridle  horse.  One  fine  day  Erin  "took  charge" 
of  his  owner,  and  with  his  head  in  the  air  started  off  at 
full  gallop,  jumping  in  his  career  the  dry  lock  of  a  canal 
in  the  Vale  of  Belvoir.  Of  Leicestershire  White  men- 
tion is  made  elsewhere,  while  Mr.  Maxse,  whose  name  is 


no  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

so  often  mentioned  in  Mr.  Assheton  Smith's  Life,  was 
also  hunting  in  Leicestershire  in  Squire  Osbaldeston's 
time.  Mr.  Maxse  was  one  of  the  welter  weights  of  the 
Hunt,  but  he  had  a  formidable  rival  in  "  Saddle  "  Camp- 
bell— so  called  from  the  place  where  his  property  was 
situate  ;  and  though  Campbell's  weight  exceeded  that  of 
Mr.  Maxse,  the  former  generally  contrived  to  beat  the 
latter,  until  at  last  the  "  Ajax  of  heavy  weights,"  as  Mr. 
Smith  called  Mr.  Maxse,  became  so  angry  that  whenever 
it  was  possible  he  made  a  point  of  always  going  out  with 
the  pack  which  was  not  to  be  honoured  with  "  Saddle" 
Campbell's  company. 

The  Marquis  of  Tweeddale,  a  most  determined  horse- 
man, occasionally  hunted  with  the  Quorn,  though  he  was 
more  often  seen  with  the  Belvoir,  and  he  it  was  who 
once  mounted  the  Duke  of  Wellington  on  so  perfect  a 
hunter  that  the  duke  was  afterwards  heard  to  say  that 
Leicestershire  was  an  easier  country  to  cross  than  he 
thought.  Then,  again,  "Davie"  Baird,  afterwards  Sir 
David,  a  great  chum  of  "Saddle"  Campbell's,  was  another 
of  the  "  Scottish  Brigade,"  who  did  great  things.  The 
story  goes  that  no  sooner  did  he  appear  in  Leicestershire 
than  he  at  once  took  his  place  in  the  front  rank,  though 
owning  at  the  time  a  rather  rickety  stud.  It  is  said  that 
he  could  ride  anything,  and  would  "shove  along"  on  a 
bad  horse  better  than  most  people  could  on  a  good  one. 
An  old  song,  said  to  have  been  written  by  "Saddle" 
Campbell,  at  that  time  the  Melton  laureate,  made 
mention  of — 

Davie  Baird  on  Jamie  Hope 
Swift  o'er  the  grassy  slope. 

Jamie  Hope  was  "a  thoroughbred  cross-made  horse 
which  had  been  stumbling  about  with  a  whip  in  Scotland 
for  several  years."  Davie  Baird  got  hold  of  him,  and 
after   riding   him    through    a  famous    run    in    his   well- 


MR.    GEORGE    OSBALDESTON  in 

known  style,  sold  him  for  £joo,  and  on  the  sale  reaching 
the  ears  of  his  father,  a  master  of  hounds  in  Scotland, 
Baird  pere  is  reported  to  have  said,  "  It  matters  little, 
for  though  Davie  has  sold  the  fiddle,  he  has  not  parted 
with  the  bow."  This  anecdote  has  been  told  in  a 
variety  of  forms  of  different  people  ;  but  as  it  was  re- 
lated of  Davie  Baird  in  Bell's  Life  as  long  ago  as  1840, 
it  is  as  likely  as  not  to  be  the  original  version. 

During  Mr.  Osbaldeston's  mastership  of  the  Quorn, 
John  Gully  used  to  spend  a  good  deal  of  time  with  the 
Squire,  for  though  not  much  of  a  bruiser  over  a  country 
he  was  devoted  to  hunting,  and  afterwards,  when  he 
bought  Ackworth  Park,  near  Pontefract,  he  became 
a  great  supporter  of  the  Badsworth.  Among  John 
Gully's  hunters  was  a  much-admired  horse  called  Jack 
Ketch,  and  in  connection  with  him  a  curious  story  was 
current  in  Leicestershire.  After  Gully's  stud  was  sold, 
a  Meltonian  whose  new  horse  was  admired  said  that  it 
was  Gully's  Jack  Ketch,  and  he  added  that  there  never 
was  a  better.  Whereupon  another  man  said,  "  My  good 
sir,  you  surely  must  be  crazy,  for  the  horse  I  am  now 
riding  is  Gully's  Jack  Ketch.  I  bought  him  from 
Milton,  who  purchased  all  Gully's  horses."  Only  a 
few  days  later  a  third  and  a  fourth  Jack  Ketch  turned 
up,  and  on  inquiries  being  set  on  foot  it  appeared  that 
the  dealer  in  question,  knowing  that  the  original  Jack 
Ketch  had  a  marvellous  reputation,  reduplicated  him 
ad  lib.,  so  that  eventually  no  one  claimed  to  have  the 
original  horse. 

In  the  company  of  thrusters  in  which  he  found 
himself  the  Squire  was  quite  capable  of  holding  his 
own  ;    but  to  timber  he  always  had  an  intense  dislike. 

"  I   hate  that  d d  carpentry,"  was  his  remark  when 

timber  came  in  the  line  ;  but  over  other  kinds  of  fences 
he  rode  fearlessly  enough. 

It  was  in  the  early  part  of  182  1  that  he  met  with  the 


ii2  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

bad  fall  which  caused  him  ever  afterwards  to  object  to 
any  one  riding  near  him  at  a  fence.  He  was  hunting 
with  Lord  Anson's  hounds  in  the  Atherstone  country 
when  his  horse,  after  dropping  his  hind  legs  into  a  ditch, 
rolled  over.  Sir  James  Musgrave,  riding  close  in  his 
wake,  was  not  able  to  stop  his  horse  in  time,  and  jumped 
first  on  the  Squire's  prostrate  steed  and  then  on  to 
Mr.  Osbaldeston  himself,  and  with  such  violence  as  to 
break  his  leg  in  two  places.1  A  couple  of  doctors  were 
fortunately  out,  and  everything  possible  was  done  for 
the  unfortunate  gentleman  ;  but  at  the  end  of  the  season 
1820-21  Mr.  Osbaldeston  gave  up  the  Ouorn,  and  ex- 
changing with  Sir  Bellingham  Graham,  who  was  then 
master  of  the  Hambledon,  went  into  Hampshire,  where 
however  he  remained  for  a  short  time  only,  and  the 
spring  of  1823  saw  him  back  at  Ouorn  again,  when  the 
sport  he  had  previously  shown  was  to  a  great  extent 
revived.  There  was  a  rumour  that  the  country  was 
short  of  foxes  in  some  parts  ;  but  whether  the  state- 
ment was  true  or  whether  steps  were  taken  to  remedy 
the  deficiency  there  is  no  means  of  knowing,  but  at  any 
rate  the  Squire  killed,  or  is  said  to  have  killed,  thirty 
brace  of  foxes  before  regular  hunting  began  in  Novem- 
ber 1824. 

During  cub-hunting  many  good  runs  took  place,  and 
November  set  in  with  a  rare  vein  of  sport. 

On  the  15th  November  1824  Mr.  Osbaldeston  met  at  Sea- 
grave  ;  found  in  Munday's  Gorse,  and  hounds  ran  the  fox  to  old 
Dalby  Wood,  and  then  after  a  ring  of  about  four  or  five  miles, 
hunted  him  well  to  Schoby  Scholes,  where  the  hounds  unluckily 


1  On  the  day  after  the  Squire's  accident  Tom  Sebright,  then  first  whipper- 
in,  hunted  the  hounds,  and  had  one  of  the  best  runs  he  ever  saw  in  Leices- 
tershire. The  fox  which  gave  the  run  was  known  as  "  Perpetual  Motion  "  ; 
he  was  found  at  Schoby  Scholes,  and  ran,  or  is  said  to  have  run,  to  Garthorpe 
Lodge,  a  fourteen  miles  in  and  out  journey,  with  only  one  short  check, 
in  an  hour  and  twenty  minutes, 


MR.    GEORGE    OSBALDESTON  113 

hit  upon  a  fresh  fox,  and  getting  away  on  good  terms  with  him 
raced  away  by  Saxelby  and  Grimstone.  At  Schoby  Scholes  the 
hounds  slipped  all  the  field  except  Mr.  Holyoake  and  Mr.  Oxen- 
don,  who  was  on  a  visit  to  Dr.  Leeke,  of  Nottinghamshire.  These 
two,  it  is  true,  had  a  bad  start,  but  they  were  at  any  rate  able 
to  see  the  way  hounds  went,  though  perhaps  their  view  was  a 
distant  one.  Eventually  the  fox  was  lost  in  the  "  Six  Hills 
country,"  just  in  the  nick  of  time  as  the  report  says,  for  every 
horse  which  struggled  on  to  the  finish  was  completely  done  up. 
It  was,  from  all  accounts,  useless  for  any  one  to  try  to  overtake 
the  pack,  but  even  those  who  rode  the  lanes  and  byways  could 
not  keep  up  with  them,  and  at  the  end  there  was  hardly  a  horse 
which  could  trot. 

Only  a  few  days  afterwards,  that  is  to  say,  on  the  23rd  of 
November,  another  good  run  took  place.  After  meeting  at 
Gaddesby,  hounds  went  to  Cream  Gorse,  whence  a  fox  stole  away, 
and  the  hounds  being  on  the  outside  of  the  covert  at  the  time, 
they  soon  hit  off  the  line.  The  fox  skirted  Ashby  Pasture  to 
Thorpe  Trussells,  and  ran  thence  to  Thorpe  Satchville,  after- 
wards taking  a  direct  line  to  Burrough  Hill.  At  Adcock's  Barn 
the  fox  made  a  short  turn  to  the  left,  almost  in  face  of  the 
horsemen,  and  eventually  the  hounds  ran  into  him,  after  a  very 
fast  forty  minutes,  in  the  middle  of  a  large  field  between  Melton 
and  Kirby  Park.  All  those  who  held  good  places  up  to  Adcock's 
Barn  were  thrown  out  at  that  point,  and  never  saw  hounds  again 
until  long  after  they  had  killed  their  fox. 

The  only  man  with  the  hounds  all  through  was  that  fine 
horseman  Dick  Burton,  Mr.  Osbaldeston's  first  whipper-in,  and 
for  more  than  a  mile  he  saw  the  fox  in  front  of  the  hounds. 
Close  to  the  field  in  which  he  was  pulled  down,  the  fox  crossed 
a  road  close  to  Dick  Burton,  and  then  he  lay  down  "  coiled  up 
like  a  dog  before  the  fire,"  as  Dick  said.  Three  couples  of 
hounds,  which  were  two  hundred  yards  ahead  of  the  rest,  ran 
right  over  him;  but  the  main  body,  less  hasty,  killed  him. 

On  the  26th  November  1825  the  Ouorn  met  at 
Brawnston,  near  Leicester,  and  finding  a  second  fox  at 
Glen  Gorse,  hounds  ran  him  for  some  distance  ;  but  just 
as  they  were  on  the  point  of  killing  him,  Mr.  Osbal- 
deston  suddenly  stopped  the  hounds  owing  to  their 
being  overridden    by  oik-  of    the   held,    who  must   have 

H 


ii4  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

been  on  an  uncommonly  good  hunter,  unless  he  had 
managed  to  pick  up  his  second  horse,  as  when  the 
hounds  were  stopped  all  the  horses  were  said  to  have 
had  quite  enough  galloping,  and  Mr.  Holyoake  was 
obliged  to  have  his  hunter  bled. 

The  season  1824-25  appears  to  have  opened  with 
every  promise  of  success.  House  accommodation  was 
at  a  premium,  while  sport  continued  to  be  of  the  best, 
all  the  horses  being  knocked  up  day  after  day  from  all 
accounts.  For  example,  on  the  23rd  December  1824 
hounds  met  at  Owthorpe  and  had  an  extremely  fast  run 
of  an  hour  and  fifteen  minutes.  Sir  Harry  Goodricke 
had  the  luck  to  pick  up  his  second  or  third  horse,  and 
took  the  fox  from  the  hounds.  Mr.  Osbaldeston  and 
Dick  Burton  were  beaten  some  way  from  the  finish, 
while  of  those  who  rode  one  horse  all  through  the  run,  the 
honour  lay  with  Lord  Rancliffe,  who  struggled  on  nearly 
to  the  end,  Mr.  Holyoake  and  Mr.  Johnson  being  perhaps 
the  next  best  off.  Just  about  this  time  Dick  Burton 
sustained  one  of  his  many  serious  falls  ;  his  horse  rolled 
over  him,  and  one  of  the  bones  of  the  pelvis  was  broken. 

Mr.  Osbaldeston  was  styled  by  Colonel  Lowther 
"  the  moonlight  hunter "  and  "  Georgium  Sidus,"  but 
great  as  was  his  reputation  as  a  horseman,  he  was  some- 
times beaten.  There  was  a  somewhat  notorious  hunter 
named  Assheton  which  eventually  became  the  property 
of  Mr.  Holyoake,  who  was  too  heavy  for  him,  and  could 
not  ride  him  ;  nor  for  that  matter  could  Mr.  Osbaldeston  ; 
though  on  one  occasion  Assheton  carried  him  well  in  a 
run  from  Billesdon  Coplow  to  Ranksborough.  Dick 
Burton,  however,  who  could  always  get  on  with  Assheton, 
had  ridden  him  during  a  hard  morning's  work,  and  it  was 
only  when  the  edge  was  thus  taken  off  him  that  the 
Squire  was  able  to  shine  upon  him.1     At  this  time,  how- 

1  Ferneley,  the  artist,  painted  Mr.  Osbaldeston  mounted  on  Assheton  in 
the  act  of  jumping  a  gate — in  spite  of  his  hatred  of  carpentry — while  Sir 


MR.    GEORGE    OSBALDESTON  115 

ever,  Parson  Empson,  "  the  flying  parson,"  as  he  was 
called,  had  a  horse  called  "Shaver"  which  was  Asshe- 
ton's  master,  as  he  was  just  as  speedy,  as  stout,  and  was 
as  good  a  fencer,  while  in  addition  he  had  a  much  more 
angelic  temper. 

In  bringing  to  a  close  these  notes  on  Mr.  Osbal- 
deston's  career  as  master  of  the  Quorn,  it  must  suffice  to 
note  that  he  was  a  good  all-round  sportsman  and  athlete. 
He  was  a  good  steeplechase  rider,  shot,  pedestrian, 
pugilist,  and  billiard  player  ;  but  an  extended  notice  of 
his  excellence  in  these  diversions  would  be  outside  the 
purview  of  this  book.  His  old  friend  Mr.  Wheeler  has 
written  about  him  and  his  exploits  in  Sportascrapia.ua, 
and  in  another  book  '  the  present  writer  has  given  sundry 
particulars  concerning  "the  Squire."  He  unfortunately 
took  to  the  turf ;  lost  much  money  at  racing,  and  died  in 
somewhat  straitened  circumstances,  at  his  house  in  St. 
John's  Wood,  on  the  1st  August  1866.  It  was  in  the 
year  1831,  when  Mr.  Osbaldeston  was  in  his  forty-sixth 
year,  that  he  accomplished  at  Newmarket  his  famous 
ride  of  two  hundred  miles  in  eight  hours  and  forty 
minutes,  using  twenty-eight  horses. 

Harry  Goodricke  on  Dr.  Russell,  and  Mr.  Holyoake  on  Crossbar,  are  jump- 
ing the  fence  at  each  side.  When  Mr.  Osbaldeston  saw  the  picture  he  is 
reported  to  have  exclaimed  that  a  cleverer  hunter  than  Assheton  was  never 
foaled.  A  portrait  of  Mr.  Osbaldeston  was  also  engraved  by  Roffe,  from  a 
painting  by  Dr.  Woodhouse,  Fellow  of  Caius  College,  Cambridge,  in  1835 
or  1836. 

1  Notitia  Venatica,  new  edition  (Nimmo). 


n6  THE    QUORN    HUNT 


SIR    BELLINGHAM    GRAHAM 
1821— 1823 

AS   already  mentioned,   that  fine  sportsman   Sir   Bel- 
l      lingbam    Graham   ruled    the    Ouorn    country   for 
a    couple    of   seasons    (1821-23)    between    Mr.    Osbal- 
deston's  two  periods   of  mastership  ;   and   on  reviewing 
his    career    as    a    master    of   hounds,    one    can    scarcely 
avoid    agreeing    with    "  Nimrod,"    who    regretted    that 
Sir  Bellingham  had   not   confined   himself  to  one  good 
country   instead  of  hunting  so  many,    "  some  of  which 
were  of  an  indifferent  character."     Personally  I  do  not 
desire    to    brand    as    indifferent    such    countries    as    the 
Pytchley,     Badsworth,     Atherstone,    Shiffnal    (now    the 
Albrighton),  and  Shropshire;  but  Sir  Bellingham  Graham 
was,  like  Mr.  Osbaldeston,  a  master  who  hopped  about 
from  country  to  country,  "to  one  thing  constant  never." 
He   began   his   career    by    succeeding   Mr.    Musters 
in   the    Badsworth   country,    which    he    hunted    for   two 
seasons ;    then  he    migrated    to   the   Atherstone,   where 
he  remained  for  three  years  ;    and  then  he  hunted  the 
Pytchley  for  a  single  season  (1820-21),  and  it  may  here 
be   mentioned   that    Sir    Bellingham    Graham   and    Mr. 
Osbaldeston  are  the  only  two  men  who  have  ever  been 
masters  of  both  the  famous  hunts,  the  Quorn  and  Pytch- 
ley.     In  addition,  Sir   Bellingham  had  a  turn  with  the 
Hambledon  (when  he  exchanged  with  Mr.  Osbaldeston, 
and  declared  that  the  subscription  would  not  find  him  in 
spur-straps  and  blacking).    He  did  not  stay  long  in  Hamp- 
shire, the  hunting  not  being  brilliant  enough  lor  him. 


SIR    BELLINGHAM    GRAHAM  117 

It  is,  however,  with  the  Ouorn  only  that  I  am  now 
concerned.  Sir  Bellingham  Graham's  reputation  had  so 
far  preceded  him  into  Leicestershire  that  it  was  taken 
for  granted  he  would  hunt  the  country  as  well  as  it  could 
be  hunted,  and  in  proof  of  this  he  received  the  largest 
subscription  ever  given  to  a  master  of  the  Quorn, 
namely,  considerably  over  four  thousand  a  year.  Soon 
after  Mr.  Osbaldeston's  accident  with  Lord  Anson's 
hounds,  the  former  wrote  to  the  members  of  the  Hunt, 
through  the  medium  of  the  local  paper,  to  say  that  he 
was  compelled  to  give  up  the  country  ;  and  Sir  Belling- 
ham wrote  to  the  same  journal  offering  himself  as  the 
Squire's  successor,  an  offer  which  was  readily  accepted. 

Sir  Bellingham  Graham,  a  fine  horseman,  is  said  to 
have  had  in  the  Ouorn  stables  the  best  collection  of  good 
big  horses  ever  seen,  not  even  excepting  Lord  Sefton's, 
and  no  one  ever  hunted  the  country  in  more  liberal  style. 
During  the  two  seasons  he  ruled  Leicestershire  there 
was  not,  it  was  said,  a  single  instance  of  his  not  being 
with  hounds,  which  was  the  more  remarkable  because 
when  he  first  came  he  did  not  know  the  country  ;  while 
in  his  first  season  the  long-continued  rain  had  made  the 
country  uncommonly  deep  and  holding.  Sir  Bellingham 
was  a  heavy  weight,  but  he  went  with  the  best,  and  his 
straight  riding  brought  him  to  grief  at  the  beginning  of 
his  second  season,  for  while  hunting  his  hounds  on 
Boxing  Day  1822,  he  rode  at  a  gate — or  at  an  ox-fence, 
according  to  another  account — apparently  close  to  the 
post,  which  his  horse  struck,  and  down  came  the  pair, 
while  one  of  the  field,  riding  behind,  fell  at  the  same 
obstacle,  and  tumbled  on  Sir  Bellingham,  who  remained 
insensible,  it  is  said,  for  something  like  twenty  -  four 
hours,  during  which  time  he  was  bled  three  times,  in 
accordance  with  the  drastic  measures  of  the  day.  His 
chest  was  much  injured,  and  for  five  days  he  was  con- 
fined to  his  bed  ;  but  on  the  seventh  he  was  muffled  up 


n8  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

in  shawls,  and  managed  to  get  out  in  a  carriage,  just 
to  see  his  hounds  find  ;  but  he  even  went  further ;  he 
is  reported  to  have  called  for  one  of  his  horses,  which 
was  being  ridden  by  a  groom,  and  to  have  taken  com- 
mand of  his  hounds,  until,  thoroughly  exhausted,  he  was 
compelled  to  give  in. 

Sir  Bellinsfham  Graham  had  a  famous  horse  called 
Cock  Robin,  on  which  he  once  slipped  away  from  covert 
and  a  large  field  by  jumping  in  and  out  of  some  double 
rails,  between  which  there  was  barely  room  to  land. 
On  another  occasion,  when  the  hounds  ran  hard  from 
Glen  Gorse  to  Stanton  Wood,  the  master  took  the 
lead  and  kept  it,  notwithstanding  the  fact  that  several 
of  the  best  light  weights  in  England,  including  Colonel 
George  Anson  and  Mr.  William  Coke,  were  very  close 
to  him,  but  they  could  not  overtake  him. 

It  was  during  Sir  Bellingham  Graham's  mastership 
that  there  died  a  somewhat  remarkable  Leicestershire 
character,  one  Job  Inchley,  a  horse-dealer.  He  was 
born  about  1753,  and  in  his  younger  days  sold  a  good 
many  horses  to  the  followers  of  Mr.  Meynell,  and  for 
some  reason  or  other  his  portrait  was  painted  by 
Marshall  for  some  nobleman,  whose  name  is  not  given. 
Unlike  most  dealers,  however,  Job  Inchley  had  fancies 
of  his  own,  and  after  a  while  he  dealt  in  classes  of  horses 
which  did  not  find  general  favour.  A  critic  of  the  time 
says  that  he  at  one  time  bought  blood  horses  of  the  type 
called  by  Jacob  Wardel  "slashers,"  but  which  were  not 
suitable  for  the  purpose  intended.  Some  of  these  he 
trained  and  ran  in  races  ;  but  they  "  were  not  fast  enough 
to  tire  themselves,  nor  stout  enough  to  win."  Eventually 
Job  Inchley's  fancies  brought  him  to  grief,  and  after 
parting  with  his  little  freehold  property,  he  died  in 
London  without  a  shilling,  during  the  mastership  of  Sir 
Bellingham  Graham.  In  his  dress,  Job  is  said  to  have 
been  very  peculiar.      To  all  appearance  he  always  wore 


SIR    BELLINGHAM    GRAHAM  119 

the  same  clothes  ;  his  boots  were  seldom  cleaned  ;  but 
when  they  were  it  was  with  a  wisp  of  hay  and  some 
water.  In  his  horse-dealinsf  transactions  he  was  said  to 
be  straight  enough  ;  but  he  was  undoubtedly  eccentric. 

During  the  autumn  of  182 1  the  idea  appears  to  have 
occurred  to  the  Leicestershire  hunting  men  that  it  would 
be  a  good  thing  to  have  a  pack  of  staghounds,  and  the 
proposal  was  made  that  they  should  be  established  under 
the  mastership  of  Lord  Brudenell,  but  the  project  fell 
through. 

Mr.  Osbaldeston  was,  however,  somewhat  late  in 
making  known  his  intention  to  resign  the  country,  for 
although  the  Quorn  fixtures  were  published  in  the  local 
papers  on  the  2nd  November  1821,  Mr.  Osbaldeston's 
letter  intimating  his  intention  of  resigning  the  country 
did  not  appear  in  print  until  the  29th  of  the  month, 
though  Sir  Bellingham  Graham  offered  his  services  on 
the  22nd;  but  it  had  doubtless  been  arranged  between 
them  that  the  one  would  give  up  and  the  other  would 
apply  for  the  country. 

As  was  only  to  be  expected,  Sir  Bellingham  Graham 
showed  capital  sport  during  the  short  time  he  hunted  the 
Quorn  country.  One  Saturday  in  November  182 1,  the 
hounds  met  at  Preston  Wold,  and  found  a  fox  in  Mr. 
Packe's  gardens. 

The  fox  went  away  over  the  lawn  towards  Barton-on-the-Wold, 
and  hounds  ran  at  a  great  pace  thence  to  Walton  Thorns,  and, 
skirting  Mr.  Story's  plantation  and  Rugdale  Hall,  went  on,  leaving 
Schoby  Scholes  a  short  distance  on  the  right.  The  fox  then  crossed 
Dalby  Wold  in  the  direction  of  the  Windmill,  which  he  left  on  the 
right,  and  running  thence  to  Broughton  Grounds,  went  nearly  to 
Parson's  Gorse,  and  turning  short  at  Broughton,  crossed  the 
Smite  near  Clawson,  and  bore  to  the  left  in  the  direction  of  Kin- 
noulton.  Thence  the  line  lay  in  the  direction  of  Hose,  and  the 
fox  crossed  the  Vale  of  Belvoir;  but  by  that  time  he  was  done  up, 
and  hounds  rolled  him  over  in  a  field  near  Piper  Hole,  where  he 
lay  down,  the  run  having  lasted  two  hours  and  ten  minutes.      It  is 


120  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

said  that  there  was  not  a  check  from  start  to  finish,  and  that  out 
of  a  field  of  about  three  hundred,  four  only  saw  the  finish.  It 
was  one  of  the  best  runs,  we  are  told,  ever  known. 

In  November  1822  Sir  Bellingham  met  with  his 
second  accident,  his  horse  falling  with  him  at  a  big 
fence,  but  beyond  being-  bruised,  he  sustained  no  serious 
injury. 

March  1823  saw  another  good  run,  but  neither  the 
place  of  meeting  nor  the  covert  in  which  the  fox  was 
found  is  mentioned.      The  account  is  that 

The  hounds  had  one  of  the  severest  days  recollected  for  some 
years  past.  A  fox  went  away  towards  Stretton  Hall,  by  Glenn 
Town  to  Burton  Overy  by  Carlton,  near  to  Stoughton  Holt, 
through  Stourton  Wood  to  Stourton  Town,  and  afterwards  to 
Church  Langton.  The  fox  then  crossed  the  Welland,  ran  through 
Langton  Caudle,  and  thence  to  Glooston  Wood  to  Hallaton  Bot- 
toms. Running  thence  nearly  to  Allerton  Wood,  the  line  lay  to 
Stockerston  Wood,  where  hounds  were  stopped.  The  hounds 
found  directly  they  were  put  into  covert,  and  those  who  were  a 
few  minutes  late  saw  nothing  of  the  run.  The  master,  Mr.  Anson, 
and  Mr.  Coke  were  the  only  three  who  were  with  hounds  from 
start  to  finish. 

In  April  of  1823  Sir  Bellingham  Graham  announced 
his  intention  of  giving  up  the  Quorn,  and  at  the  same 
time  Mr.  Osbaldeston  sought  the  suffrages  of  the  mem- 
bers of  the  Hunt  for  the  second  time,  and  his  offer  was 
accepted.  His  second  period  of  mastership  was  marked 
by  several  good  runs.  Sir  Bellingham  Graham  left  the 
Quorn  country,  to  the  great  regret  of  his  field. 


LORD    SOUTHAMPTON  121 


LORD    SOUTHAMPTON 

1827   1831 

AMONG  the  many  keen  and  hard-riding  hunting 
.  men  who  from  time  to  time  had  visited  Leicester- 
shire was  the  Lord  Southampton  who  had  hunted  with 
the  Ouorn,  and  he  was,  in  the  year  1827,  induced  to 
become  the  next  master  of  that  famous  pack. 

Mr.  Osbaldeston  signalised  his  last  season  as  master 
of  the  Ouorn  by  taking  the  hounds  out  every  day,  the 
hour  of  meeting  being  ten  o'clock  on  some  days  and  half- 
an-hour  later  on  others,  while  towards  the  end  of  May  a 
notice  appeared  in  the  Leicester  Journal that  all  persons 
having  any  claim  upon  the  Ouorn  Hunt  for  coverts  and 
earth-stopping  should  attend  at  certain  places  on  certain 
days  and  at  specified  hours  to  have  their  claims  satisfied, 
though  whether  this  notice  was  issued  by  the  Squire  or 
Lord   Southampton   is  not  certain. 

It  would  appear,  however,  that  everything  was  not 
as  it  should  be  at  the  time  of  Lord  Southampton's  acces- 
sion to  office.  When  Mr.  Osbaldeston's  second  term  of 
mastership  came  to  an  end,  the  Ouorn  country  was  said 
to  be  nearly  destitute  of  foxes.  P^or  some  time  pre- 
viously it  had  been  found  expedient  to  cultivate  friendly 
relations  with  the  workmen  in  the  Swithland  slate  quar- 
ries, in  order  to  prevent  the  destruction  of  the  cubs  bred 
in  the  rocks  and  coverts  near  the  works.  Apparently 
some  kindly  sportsman  had  been  in  the  habit  of  pro- 
pitiating the  quarrymen,  but  by  the  time  July  1827 
arrived,    this     had     become    nobody's    business,    so    the 


122  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

supply  of  foxes  had  suffered  in  consequence,  and  the 
local  journal  entertained  fears  not  only  for  the  litters  in 
the  immediate  vicinity  of  the  quarries,  but  also  in  the 
Alscroft  and  Newtown  Woods,  as  well  as  in  the  Grooby 
coverts,  Barndon  Hill,  Grace  Dieu  Park,  and  the  Forest 
generally.  In  Oakley,  Piper,  and  Spring  Woods,  and  a 
few  other  places,  there  was  reason  to  hope  for  better 
things,  and  there  was  something  like  a  chance  for  the 
Melton  and  Harborough  sides.  In  earlier  days,  when 
every  possible  care  was  taken,  "an  importation  of  foxes 
was  almost  uniformly  necessary  in  the  Ouorndon  Hunt," 
but  the  paper  in  question  reminded  its  readers  that  this 
was  not  to  be  wondered  at  considering  that,  as  the  hounds 
were  out  every  day,  more  foxes  were  killed  in  the  Ouorn 
than  in  any  other  hunt  in  England. 

Lord  Southampton  certainly  started  at  a  disadvantage, 
for  he  was  young  and  knew  nothing  about  hunting. 
Moreover,  when  he  signified  his  intention  of  taking  the 
Ouorn  country  he  had  neither  hounds,  that  is  to  say  none 
to  speak  of,  nor  huntsman.  Mr.  Osbaldeston  left  some 
old  stagers  (about  forty  couples,  it  is  said),  considerably 
blemished ;  some  of  them  had  lost  an  eye.  Lord 
Southampton  bought  about  twenty  couples  from  Mr. 
Nicolls,  of  the  New  Forest,  but  there  was  not  a  sound 
hound  among  them.  To  these  cripples  and  aged  ones 
were  added  about  twenty  couples  from  Mr.  Musters 
and  some  from  Belvoir,  so  that  "on  paper"  the  scratch 
kennel  appeared  fairly  strong,  but  out  of  the  whole  no 
huntsman  could  have  made  up  one  decent  pack,  for  the 
Belvoir  hounds  were  nearly  twice  the  size  of  those  from 
the  New  Forest.  With  this  material  did  Lord  South- 
ampton attempt  to  maintain  the  prestige  of  the  famous 
Quorn  Hunt. 

Lord  Southampton,  however,  was  unremitting  in  his 
endeavours  to  show  sport ;  he  considered  the  farmers' 
interests  and  was  extremely  popular  with  them,  while  his 


LORD    SOUTHAMPTON  123 

affability  gained  him  friends  everywhere.  He  perhaps 
made  one  mistake,  the  result  of  his  want  of  experience  in 
hunting, — he  allowed  himself  to  be  guided  by  a  clique  at 
Melton  who  had  ends  of  their  own  to  serve,  and  listening 
to  these  advisers  sometimes  led  to  some  portion  of  the 
country  being  too  seldom  visited. 

The  first  two  seasons  of  Lord  Southampton's  master- 
ship were  anything  but  brilliant.  When  he  collected  his 
first  scratch  pack  he  promoted  to  the  post  of  huntsman 
Dick  Burton,  who  had  whipped  in  to  Assheton  Smith 
and  also  to  Mr.  Osbaldeston.  Like  many  more,  how- 
ever, though  an  excellent  whipper-in,  he  turned  out  a 
poor  huntsman,  and  neither  he  nor  his  hounds  gave 
satisfaction  to  the  followers  of  the  Quorn. 

Although  Lord  Southampton  showed  in  his  first 
season  a  very  moderate  amount  of  sport,  fogs  appear  to 
have  been  rather  prevalent  after  the  first  week  or  two 
of  the  regular  hunting  season.  On  December  3,  1827, 
the  Quorn  met  at  Six  Hills,  when  among  the  field  were 
Lord  Rancliffe,  Lord  Plymouth,  Lord  Darlington,  and 
Sir  Harry  Goodricke.  The  field  arrived  at  the  place 
of  meeting  only  to  find  it  enveloped  in  fog.  Lord 
Southampton  was  at  first  inclined  to  make  the  best  of 
circumstances,  and  try  what  could  be  done  in  another 
district,  but  Dick  Burton  recommended  an  hour's  wait, 
and  this  was  eventually  agreed  to.  It  was  then  possible 
to  draw,  and  hounds  had  a  very  decent  run.  Just  before 
the  hounds  moved  off,  however,  it  was  discovered  that 
Dick  Burton's  horse  had  in  some  unaccountable  manner 
badly  staked  himself,  so  Lord  Rancliffe  proffered  his 
second  horse,  which  was  thankfully  accepted — an  inci- 
dent which  seems  to  show  that  at  that  time  the  Quorn 
huntsman  did  not  always  enjoy  the  luxury  of  a  second 
horse,  or  he  would  have  ridden  it.  Lord  Rancliffe's  horse 
is  described  as  having  been  a  Galloway,  by  Cervantes, 
and  on  him  Dick  Burton  went  in  his  best  style,  clearing  at 


i24  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

the  close  of  the  run  a  rate  which  no  other  horse  in  the 
field  would  face.  There  is  not,  perhaps,  very  much  data 
to  go  upon,  but  in  a  great  many  instances  we  find  it 
recorded  that  many  Leicestershire  hunters,  at  any  rate 
up  to  the  end  of  the  twenties,  and  in  some  cases  a 
little  later,  were,  comparatively  speaking,  ponies.  Old 
Stephen  Goodall,  riding  something  like  nineteen  stone, 
would  never  look  at  a  horse  much  over  fifteen  hands  ; 
Lord  Jersey  had  three  in  his  stable  which  were  said  not 
to  reach  that  height  ;  Lord  Alvanley's  best  hunter  is 
reported  to  have  been  under  fifteen  hands  one  inch,  and 
other  instances  might  be  quoted.  To-day,  as  most 
people  are  aware,  the  ideal  Leicestershire  horse  is  not 
under  fifteen  hands  three  inches,  though  of  course  there 
are  some  exceptions  ;  but  it  is  a  matter  of  stable  faith 
that  a  good  big  one  is  better  than  a  good  little  one,  and, 
as  Whyte-Melville  has  remarked,  when  a  little  horse 
gets  to  the  end  of  a  big  run,  especially  under  a  big 
weight,  he  is  mentioned  because  he  is  a  little  one. 

On  the  2 1 st  January  1828  the  Ouorn  had  a  run 
which  was  estimated  at  eighteen  miles  from  point  to 
point,  but  hounds  were  said  to  have  gone  thirty-five 
miles,  and  the  time  was  given  as  two  hours  seventeen 
minutes.  The  time  may  be  correct,  but  the  distance 
certainly  is  not. 

Before  the  year  1828  had  run  its  course  the  Ouorn 
hounds  made  their  appearance  at  the  covert  -  side 
(Mowsley)  "  in  a  new  carriage  invented  by  the  Earl  of 
Southampton,  and  constructed  at  his  Lordship's  private 
cost."  This  vehicle  was  sufficiently  capacious  to  convey 
any  reasonable  number  of  hounds  to  a  fixture.  It  was 
built  by  Ferneley  of  Thrussington,  and  was  covered  in 
at  the  top  with  black  glazed  leather,  with  railings  at  the 
side,  while  on  the  front  sat  the  coachman,  huntsman, 
and  whippers-in.  This  hound-van  is  said  to  have  cost 
,£200. 


LORD    SOUTHAMPTON  125 

About  a  month  after  Lord  Southampton's  hound-van 
had  excited  the  interest  and  admiration  of  the  inhabit- 
ants of  the  Quorn  country,  Colonel  Russell,  on  a  horse 
named  Chesterfield  (which  formerly  belonged  to  the  earl 
of  that  name,  but  at  the  time  of  the  feat  belonged  to 
Lord  Alvanley),  made  a  somewhat  memorable  leap. 
The  hounds  were  running  hard,  the  gallant  colonel  was, 
as  usual,  taking  a  line  of  his  own,  and  was  sailing  along 
in  a  good  position,  when  an  apparently  practicable  fence 
came  in  the  way.  At  it  went  the  colonel,  and  by  the 
time  his  horse  took  off  he  was  aware  that  there  was  a 
very  wide  dyke  on  the  landing  side,  and  which,  as  he 
afterwards  confessed,  he  would  not  have  ridden  at  had 
he  known  of  its  existence.  Chesterfield,  however,  was 
equal  to  the  occasion,  and  on  subsequent  measurement 
the  distance  cleared  was  proved  to  be  33  feet  3  inches. 

At  the  time  of  which  we  are  speaking  (season 
1828-29)  hunting  brought  a  good  deal  of  grist  to  the 
local  mill,  and  some  ingenious  statistician  calculated  that 
in  the  different  Leicestershire  hunting  centres  there  were 
kept  no  fewer  than  six  hundred  horses,  and  these  were 
exclusively  used  in  following  the  hounds.  Taking  the 
annual  expense  of  each  of  these  at  ^60,  a  contributor  to 
the  Leicester  Journal  reckoned  that  no  less  a  sum  than 
,£36,000  was  brought  into  the  county  in  the  course  of 
one  year,  to  say  nothing  of  what  was  expended  by  their 
owners  in  other  directions.  In  those  days  hunting  men 
were  practically  compelled,  whether  they  liked  it  or  not, 
to  buy  their  forage  from  local  vendors,  so  at  that  time 
hunting  necessarily  put  a  good  deal  of  money  into  the 
pockets  of  the  inhabitants.  So  for  that  matter  it  does 
now.  Yet  in  the  Field  of  February  27,  1897,  will  be 
found  a  letter  written  by  a  Leicestershire  man  to 
"  Brooksby,"  one  of  the  Field s  hunting  correspondents. 
The  writer  of  the  letter  draws  attention  to  the  fact 
that  at  a  Hunt  ball  then  recently  given  a  band  and  the 


126  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

refreshments  were  supplied  by  caterers  carrying  on  busi- 
ness beyond  the  confines  of  Leicestershire,  while  at  the 
present  time  there  are  too  many  ship  oats  and  too  much 
foreign  hay  used  in  the  forage  of  hunters. 

At  the  beginning  of  the  season  1828-29,  or  rather 
towards  the  close  of  cub-hunting,  bad  luck  overtook  the 
Quorn  establishment,  as  one  whipper-in  broke  his  leg, 
and  the  other  his  collar-bone;  so  hunting  was  for  a  short 
time  suspended,  and  then,  pending  their  convalescence, 
the  master  had  to  do  the  best  he  could  with  the  kennel- 
man  and  a  groom  officiating  as  whippers-in. 

For  close  upon  two  seasons  Lord  Southampton 
rubbed  along  as  best  he  could  by  getting  drafts  from 
different  kennels,  but  towards  the  close  of  his  second 
season  (1828-29)  an  opportunity  for  effecting  a  vast 
improvement  in  the  kennel  presented  itself,  and  Lord 
Southampton  at  once  jumped  at  it.  The  Marquis  of 
Tavistock  having  determined  to  give  up  the  Oakley 
country  at  the  end  of  the  season  1828-29  to  the  Hon. 
Grantley  Berkeley,  finished  his  hunting  several  weeks 
before  the  Quorn  were  due  to  stop,  and  sold  his  hounds 
to  Lord  Southampton,  who  promptly  had  them  removed 
to  the  Quorn  kennels,  and  two  days  after  their  arrival 
they  made  their  first  appearance  at  a  Leicestershire 
covert-side.  They  were  a  capital  pack,  too,  having  a 
good  deal  of  the  old  Pytchley  and  Badminton  blood 
in  them.  George  Mountford  (a  first-class  man  in  the 
kennel,  in  the  field,  and  in  the  saddle),  who  had  been 
the  Oakley  huntsman,  came  with  them,  bringing  with 
him  his  second  whipper-in,  George  Beers,  while  Will 
Derry,  who  was  born  in  Nottinghamshire,  and  learned 
his  business  under  Mr.  Musters,  and  who  whipped  in  to 
Dick  Burton,  remained  on  as  first  whipper-in.  Mount- 
ford  had  originally  whipped  in  to  the  Berkeley  hounds 
for  several  seasons,  and  had  been  whipper-in  to  the 
Oakley  before  he  was  appointed   huntsman.      Some  of 


LORD    SOUTHAMPTON  127 

the  critics  of  the  time  said  that  he  was  not  a  very  neat 
horseman,  but  he  kept  well  with  his  hounds,  and  was 
"  the  civilest  best-tempered  fellow  in  the  world." 

The  first  time  the  new  hounds  were  out  the  fixture 
was  Breedon  Clouds,  an  extensive  covert  near  Ashby- 
de-la-Zouch.  This  was  regarded  as  a  notable  day  in 
the  Ouorn  country,  and  men  from  other  hunts  came  to 
see  how  the  new  pack  would  perform  on  this,  their  first, 
and  Dick  Burton's  last,  day  in  Leicestershire.  The 
hounds  made  quite  a  favourable  impression.  They 
found  a  good  fox  as  soon  as  they  were  in  covert;  bustled 
him  well  for  five-and-thirty  minutes,  and  then  after  a 
check  had  to  put  their  noses  down.  They  lost  their  fox, 
and,  as  they  were  not  in  anything  like  condition,  hounds 
were  then  taken  home  ;  but  they  showed  that  they  could 
run.  Two  or  three  days  later  they  were  out  again  at 
Woodhouse  Cleaves  and  found  a  fox  at  Beacon  Hill. 
He  ran  nicely  as  far  as  Garendon  Park,  where  he  turned 
back  to  the  forest,  and  after  ringing  about  for  an  hour 
was  pulled  down.  The  work  in  the  forest,  though  not 
to  everybody's  liking,  served  to  show  that  the  hounds 
could  hunt  as  well  as  run,  and  in  connection  with  Charn- 
wood  Forest  Lord  Alvanley  used  to  say  that  if  you 
should  happen  to  be  killed  there  you  would  have  your 
gravestone  beside  you.  Lord  Southampton  hunted  up 
to  May  Day,  and  having  in  the  meantime  been  helped 
from  Belvoir,  found  his  kennel  vastly  improved. 

The  opening  of  the  season  1829-30  again  saw  George 
Mountford  huntsman,  with  Will  Derry  and  George  Beers 
whipping  in  to  him.  The  excellence  of  Mountford  in  the 
kennel  was  seen  as  soon  as  cub-hunting  began.  He 
had  ten  horses  for  his  own  use  and  the  whippers-in  six 
or  seven  apiece.  Both  master  and  huntsman,  and,  of 
course,  the  field  had  their  reward  this  season  in  very 
much  improved  sport.  Before  cub-hunting  was  over 
several    good    runs    had    taken    place,    and   the   regular 


128  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

season  opened  on  Monday,  November  2,  at  Kirby  Gate, 
when  the  best  things  of  the  day  were  a  fast  twenty 
minutes  in  the  morning  and  a  very  quick  fifteen  minutes 
in  the  afternoon.  On  the  4th  November  they  had  a 
brilliant  run,  about  which  no  details  are  forthcoming;  but 
one  of  the  best  runs  of  the  season  came  off  on  Wed- 
nesday, 17th  February  1830,  when  nearly  two  hundred 
horsemen  met  the  Quorn  at  Six  Hills,  the  time  of  meet- 
ing being,  for  some  reason  or  other,  twelve  o'clock.  A 
fox  was  found  in  Lord  Aylesford's  gorse,  and  hounds 
settled  down  at  once,  but  a  too  anxious  field  over- 
rode them,  and  a  check  of  ten  minutes  was  the  result. 
Mountford,  however,  recovered  the  line,  and  thanks  to  a 
good  scent,  the  hounds  ran  at  a  great  pace  for  the  next 
four  miles,  and  as  there  were  a  good  many  ploughed 
fields  in  the  line,  it  was,  as  a  chronicler  observed,  "  better 
adapted  to  killing  the  horses  than  the  fox."  Then  the 
fox  kept  to  the  grass,  left  Melton  Mowbray  about  a  mile 
to  the  right,  ran  through  Stapleford  Park,  the  home 
of  the  cantankerous  Lord  Harborough,  and  eventually 
crossed  the  Whissendine.  By  the  time  the  brook  was 
reached  the  hounds  had  been  running  for  an  hour  and 
fifty  minutes,  and  although  upwards  of  a  hundred  reached 
its  brink,  no  more  than  about  thirty  succeeded  in  getting 
over.  On  went  the  hounds,  until  in  about  another  three 
miles  the  fox  managed  to  get  to  ground  in  Ranksborough 
Gorse,  after  a  run  of  seventeen  miles  from  where  he  was 
found,  the  distance  being  covered  in  two  hours  and  ten 
minutes.  About  a  dozen  and  a  half  of  the  morning's 
field  saw  the  finish,  among  them  being  Lord  Southamp- 
ton, Sir  Harry  Goodricke,  Mr.  White,  Mr.  Maxse,  Mr. 
Henry  Thornton,  and  Dick  Christian.  On  the  following- 
day  another  good  run  was  brought  off  over  a  still  better 
country,  the  hounds  finding  a  fox  at  Barkby  Holt  and 
losing  him  at  Garthorpe  Hill — nine  miles  in  fifty  minutes  ; 
but  the  distance  is,  perhaps,  a  little  flattered. 


LORD    SOUTHAMPTON  129 

The  pencils  of  various  artists  have  made  us  familiar 
with  the  styles  of  hunting  dress  in  vogue  at  different 
dates,  but  here  is  the  description  of  a  hunting  attire 
which  was  brought  to  the  notice  of  the  dlite  during  Lord 
Southampton's  reign.  The  cut  of  the  coat  was  described 
as  being  quite  new,  while  the  colour  depended  upon  the 
hunt.  It  was  a  double-breasted  garment  with  small 
lapels  ;  the  pockets  at  the  hips  were  cut  across,  and 
they  had  rather  wide  flaps,  while  there  were  also  flaps 
across  each  breast,  but  the  top  ones  were  not  required  to 
be  made  with  pockets.  A  buff,  or  white,  double-breasted 
cashmere  waistcoat,  with  buttons  wide  apart,  four  on 
each  side,  was  de  rigucur,  the  vest  itself  being  bound  with 
black  ealloon.  The  breeches  were  of  white  cord,  with 
ribs  running  about  three  to  the  inch,  and  they  were  made 
to  fit  as  tight  as  possible  from  the  crutch  downwards. 
They  were  short  at  the  knee,  by  which  one  may  pre- 
sume they  had  no  continuations,  and  the  tops  were 
braced  up  tightly  to  meet  them.  A  green  and  crimson 
silk  cravat  completed  what  the  journal  in  question  desig- 
nated "this  very  fashionable  and  decidedly  new  hunting 
dress."      Very  new  indeed,  one  would  imagine. 

Lord  Southampton,  like  his  predecessors,  had  occu- 
pied Ouorndon  Hall,  but  partly  perhaps  owing  to  its 
distance  from  some  of  the  fixtures,  and  partly  from  other 
reasons,  he  determined,  in  1830,  to  exchange  that  resi- 
dence for  Belgrave,  not  very  far  from  Leicester,  while 
new  kennels  were  built  at  Humberstone  Gate,  Leicester. 

Belgrave  Hall,  though  doubtless  a  very  eligible 
hunting  residence,  had  not  sufficient  stabling  for  Lord 
Southampton's  purposes,  so  he  leased  the  Bazaar,  in  the 
Humberstone  Gate,  and  there  he  kept  a  portion  of  his 
stud,  while  he  gladdened  the  hearts  of  the  surrounding 
farmers  by  ordering  in  ample  supplies  of  forage.  Quorn- 
don  Hall  then  came  once  more  into  the  market,  and  its 
attractions  were  duly  set  forth  in  the  local  journals,  the 


i3o  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

description  being  evidently  drawn  up  by  the  hand  of  a 
skilful  agent.  For  the  benefit  of  those  who  may  not 
have  read  of  the  house,  it  may  be  stated  that  it  was 
surrounded  by  1 1 7  acres  of  land,  and  was  described  as 
standing  in  the  heart  of  the  Leicestershire  country. 
One  of  its  features  was  the  fine  long  stable  containing 
twenty-one  stalls  and  five  loose-boxes,  while  there  was 
stablino"  for  eighteen  more  horses.  A  covered  ride 
afforded  a  scope  for  exercise  in  frosty  or  inclement 
weather  ;  previous  masters  had  lodged  their  hounds  in 
the  commodious  kennels ;  cottages  for  huntsman  and 
stud-groom  were  ready  to  hand,  while  the  usual  appur- 
tenances of  saddle-room,  granary,  and  what  not,  left 
nothing  to  be  desired.  The  house  itself,  "equal  to  the 
accommodation  of  a  family  of  consequence,"  included 
dining,  morning,  and  drawing-rooms,  hall  or  billiard 
room,  four-and-twenty  bedrooms,  besides  domestic 
offices,  and  the  property  was  described  as  lying  on  the 
mail-coach  road  to  Manchester,  three  miles  from  Lough- 
borough, eight  from  Leicester,  fifteen  from  Melton, 
sixteen  from  Nottingham,  and  one  hundred  and  seven 
from  London. 

The  beginning  of  Lord  Southampton's  last  season, 
1830-31,  was  far  from  auspicious.  Even  at  that  time  it 
was  the  custom  for  the  Quorn  to  meet  at  Kirby  Gate  on 
the  first  Monday  in  November ;  but  for  some  reason 
or  other  which  his  followers  did  not  know,  Lord 
Southampton  did  not  open  the  season  until  the  second 
Monday  in  the  month,  to  the  great  annoyance  of  a  good 
many  members  of  the  Hunt,  who  arrived  at  the  end  of 
October  in  anticipation  of  the  usual  arrangements  being 
carried  out.  A  beginning  once  made,  the  hounds 
showed  excellent  sport ;  but  from  some  unexplained 
cause  Lord  Southampton  saw  little  of  it  Than  he 
no  one  could  be  keener  about  hunting  during  his  first 
three    seasons,    but    during    his    last    he    appeared    to 


LORD    SOUTHAMPTON  131 

become  very  slack,  and  from  all  accounts  seldom  went 
out ;  he  had  since  he  took  the  hounds  improved  a 
good  deal  in  his  riding,  so  it  was  a  matter  of  no  little 
surprise  to  find  him  become  so  indifferent  to  hunting 
during  his  last  season. 

In  addition  to  many  other  good  runs  enjoyed  by  the 
Ouorn  during  the  time  Lord  Southampton  was  master, 
may  be  mentioned  one  which  took  place  on  the  4th 
March  1831,  the  best,  according  to  some  authorities, 
that  had  been  recorded  since  the  famous  Billesdon 
Coplow  run  in  the  year  1800.  The  Ouorn  met  at 
Brooksby,  the  hunting  residence  of  Lord  Brudenell. 
The  popularity  of  a  Ouorn  Friday  was  even  then 
established,  for  there  was  a  field  of  almost  abnormal 
proportions  present.  The  early  morning  was  suffi- 
ciently hazy  as  to  cause  not  a  few  followers  of  the 
hounds  to  consider  whether  hunting  would  be  possible  ; 
but  by  eleven  o'clock  the  weather  was  bright  enough, 
and  no  better  day  could  have  been  desired. 

The  first  draw  was  Cream  Gorse,  in  which  a  fox  was  at  once 
found,  and  he  made  the  best  of  his  way  to  Ashby  Pasture,  a  line 
which  has  been  lauded  over  and  over  again  by  many  a  generation 
of  hunting  men.  It  was  one  of  those  grand  scenting  days  which 
come  all  too  seldom  in  the  course  of  a  season,  and  hounds  never 
gave  their  fox  a  moment's  rest.  Right  through  Ashby  Pasture 
they  drove  him,  and  then  the  fox  bethought  him  of  doubling  back 
to  try  if  his  original  home,  Cream  Gorse,  would  afford  the  shelter 
he  required.  He  deemed  it  better  not  to  run  the  risk  of  coming 
to  closer  quarters  with  the  pack,  and  so  skirting  the  gorse  shaped 
his  course  for  Frisby  and  crossed  the  Leicester  turnpike  road. 
The  passage  over  this  highway  was  not  of  superlative  difficulty 
for  the  field ;  but  when  the  fox  was  found  to  have  crossed  the 
Wreake  river  the  way  was  not  so  plain.  Lord  Gardner,  a  fine 
horseman,  and  Lord  Brudenell,  who  turned  aside  from  nothing, 
came  down  at  the  water  nearly  side  by  side,  and  in  company 
with  Will  Derry,  one  of  the  whippers-in,  reached  the  far  side  in 
safety,  leaving  many  of  their  companions  unable  to  effect  a 
crossing  by  the  same  route.      Meantime  the  fox  had  set  his  mask 


132  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

for  Schoby  Scholes,  running  about  midway  between  Grimston 
and  Saxelby  to  Wartnarby  Stone  Pits.  At  undiminished  pace  the 
hounds  ran  to  Holwell  Mouth.  The  fox  skirted  the  village  of 
Holwell,  and  with  the  pack  close  at  his  brush  made  no  attempt 
to  gain  the  covert  close  at  hand,  but,  running  a  circular  course, 
went  to  Goadby,  thence  to  Eastwell,  going  within  a  few  fields  of 
Eaton  and  Braunston,  leaving  Belvoir  Castle  only  a  short  distance 
on  the  left  hand.  Reynard  then  made  his  way  to  Braunston 
Lings  covert,  and  was  finally  lost  in  Croxton  Park,  after  a  hard 
run  of  an  hour  and  thirty  minutes. 


Our  forefathers  may  have  been,  and  doubtless  were, 
excellent  sportsmen,  but  what  with  stable  management 
— well,  not  at  its  best — and  perhaps  a  too  ardent  desire 
to  see  the  finish  of  every  run,  the  horses  had  rather  a 
bad  time  of  it.  This  notable  run  cost  Lord  South- 
ampton's famous  horse  Forefather,  and  Lord  Brudenell's 
no  less  celebrated  hunter  Dandy,  their  lives  :  they  died 
through  over-exertion,  while  many  other  horses  were  so 
done  up  that  they  were  never  worth  anything  afterwards. 
Through  this  great  run  Will  Derry  rode  Segar  ;  he  was 
the  only  horse  which  went  through  from  start  to  finish, 
and  he  was  not  a  bit  the  worse  for  his  exertions.  This 
was  not  the  first  time  Will  Derry  had  the  honour  of 
beating  the  whole  field,  as  in  a  run  from  near  Rollestone 
to  Dingley  he  was  first,  Mr.  Greene  and  one  or  two 
others  being  the  only  riders  near  him.  Segar  was  after- 
wards bought  by  Sir  Harry  Goodricke. 

Lord  Southampton,  as  will  be  seen,  gave  up  the 
Ouorn  hounds  in  183 1,  but  it  was  not  until  the  year 
1838,  the  first  year  of  Lord  Suffield's  mastership,  that 
Mr.  Bernal  Osborne  wrote  an  account  of  a  famous  run 
with  Lord  Southampton's  hounds.  On  the  occasion  in 
question  the  fox  "found  himself,"  and  George  Mount- 
ford  was  quickly  after  him.  Mountford,  however,  had  a 
fall,  and  when  the  hounds  checked  he  was  not  with  them, 
so  Will   Derry  (first  whipper-in)  catching  hold  of  them 


LORD    SOUTHAMPTON  133 

caused  them  to  run  heel  way,  and  eventually  the  fox 
saved  his  brush,  but  Mr.  Bernal  Osborne,  to  give  point 
to  his  poem,  makes  the  run  end  with  a  kill.  These 
spirited  verses  are  as  follows  : — 


MELTON    IN    1830 

A    DAY    WITH     LORD     SOUTHAMPTON'S    HOUNDS 

Midst  lowering  skies,  o'ercast  and  tinged  with  red, 
Sol,  slowly  rising,  quits  his  ocean  bed ; 
Chases  the  vapours  of  the  night  away, 
Illumines  Melton,  and  proclaims  the  day ; 
Far  in  the  East  his  glorious  orb  appears, 
And  smiles  at  once  on  Helpers  and  on  Peers. 
O'er  gorse  and  wood  alike,  o'er  hill  and  plain, 
On  brooks,  still  bumpers  from  the  recent  rain, 
His  brightest  rays  he  cast ;  as  if  he  meant 
To  gladden  nature,  but  to  spoil  the  scent. 
Though  bright  his  rising,  soon  his  face  he  shrouds 
Behind  a  mantle  of  o'erspreading  clouds  ; 
And  ere  John  Clod  has  drove  afield  his  wain, 
His  jacket's  moistened  with  a  drizzling  rain. 

Now  Melton  sportsmen  for  the  chase  prepare  : 

Some  curl  their  wigs, — some  merely  curl  their  hair, — 

And  curse  that  rashness  which  has  brought  them  down 

So  far  from  Crockford's,  and  the  joys  of  town. 

Tenacious  of  his  toggery,  Musgrave  fears 

To  spoil  his  garments,  worn  for  many  years  ; 

And,  though  already  mounted,  back  he  goes, 

And  changes  old  ones  for  still  older  clothes  : 

(What's  in  a  coat?     When  hounds  run,  he  is  wont 

To  show  its  back  much  oftener  than  its  front.) 

Now  here  a  youth  who  goes  too  fast  to  last, 

On  milk  and  soda-water  breaks  his  fast  ; 

Here  older  hands,  with  stronger  stomachs  blest, 

With  tea  and  brandy  lull  their  nerves  to  rest. 

Now,  trampling  at  the  door,  the  hack  appears, 

Impatient  of  delay  he  kicks  and  rears. 

Away  !  away  !  once  mounted,  on  they  ride, 

And  soon  are  panting  at  the  cover  side. 


134  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

Hark  to  that  cheering  note  !  they've  found  him, — see 
The  gorse  is  waving  like  a  troubled  sea ; 
He's  gone  away ;  hark,  halloo  !  to  the  cry  ! 
Like  swallows  skimming,  o'er  the  fields  they  fly. 
"  Give  them  a  moment's  time, — hold  hard,  sir,  pray  ; 
You'll  stop  his  pulling  ere  we've  done  to-day." 
Look  at  the  gallant  pack,  away  they  sweep  ! 
The  pace  is  killing  and  the  country  deep. 
Rolleston  is  far  behind,  and  on  our  right, 
The  house  at  Noseley  just  appears  in  sight ; 
By  Glooston  Wood,  o'er  Cranoe  Field  they  pass, 
Where  many  a  horse  declining  missed  the  grass. 

On,  on  they  go — and  at  a  trimming  pace  ; 

See,  Baird  is  racing  for  a  foremost  place ; 

Yet  much  I  do  mistrust  me,  if  his  steed 

Can  hold  that  pace,  and  always  go  full  speed. 

White  spurts  and  cranes,  now  skirting  looks  for  balks, 

And  gallops  faster  than  our  Rokeby  talks. 

See  Chesterfield  advance  with  steady  hand, 

"  Swish  at  a  rasper,"  and  in  safety  land  ; 

Who  sits  his  horse  so  well  ?  or  at  a  race, 

Drives  four-in-hand  with  greater  skill  or  grace  ? 

And  when  hounds  really  run,  like  him  can  show, 

How  fifteen  stone  should  o'er  the  country  go  ? 

If  not  in  person  monstrous,  yet  in  weight 
Campbell  comes  crashing  through  a  new-made  gate  ; 
Now,  "  by  his  fathers'  gods  !  "  you  hear  him  swear, 
And  much  you  wonder  who  those  fathers  were. 
Now  Plymouth,  at  a  brook,  with  Gilmour  crams, 
While  Drummond1 /<?fo  his  horse  and  jobbing  damns  ; 
With  iron  hand,  and  seat  devoid  of  grace, 
You  see  at  once  the  counter  is  his  place ; 
Now  on  this  side,  and  now  on  that  he  pitches, 
Strikes  all  his  timber,  fathoms  all  his  ditches, 
Till,  by  a  binder  caught,  a  weight  of  lead, 
He  comes  at  last  to  anchor  on  his  head. 

Quite  at  his  ease,  yet  stealing  o'er  the  grass, 
From  out  the  struggling  crowd  see  Wilton  pass. 


1  This  gentleman  was  better  appreciated  in  the  City  than  at  Melton. 


LORD    SOUTHAMPTON  135 

Here  Goodricke,  perfect  in  his  hand  and  seat, 
Rides  like  a  sportsman  who  can  do  the  feat ; 
And  Stanley,  who  in  courage  may  not  yield 
To  him  of  yore,  who  fought  on  Flodden  field, 
Forgets  his  weight,  and  labours  all  he  can 
To  show  Perfection,1  both  in  horse  and  man. 
Carried  beyond  excitement's  wildest  bounds, 
His  horse  forgetting,  seeing  but  the  hounds, 
Kinnaird,  that  dear  enthusiast  of  the  chase, 
Heeds  not  how  deep  the  ground,  nor  slacks  his  pace  : 
Will  nothing  turn  or  stop  him  ?  nothing  check 
That  form  of  riding,  but  a  broken  neck  ? 


Here  Lowther  follows  slowly  on  the  track, 

And  pines  in  secret  for  his  "  tailing  pack." 

(We  speak  of  years  gone  by, — for  now  we're  told 

Their  style  of  hunting  is  not  always  cold, 

And  that  they  draw  till  one :  We  therefore  pray, 

"  That  they,  like  other  dogs,  may  have  their  day  ; " 

Since  Lambert's  judgment  has  reformed  the  pack, 

Improved  their  breeding,  and  dispensed  with  Slack,'- 

All  head  and  legs  no  longer  now  they  look, 

But  stoop  to  pick  a  leaf  from  Goosey's3  book.) 

The  gallant  Colonel,  pottering  at  the  gaps, 

First  damns,  then  envies  "  those  hard-riding  chaps." 


Gardner,4  who  then  for  raspers  ne'er  would  swerve, 
And  thought  all  riding  to  consist  in  nerve 
And  swimming  rivers, — owned  the  pace  was  good, 
But  still  would  have  it  faster  if  he  could. 
See  Heycock  flies  along ;  and  few  there  be, 
Where  all  ride  hard,  can  harder  ride  than  he. 


1  Not  improperly  so  called,  for  he  was  one  of  the  best  horses  in 
Leicestershire. 

2  The  former  huntsman  of  the  Cottesmore  hounds,  well  worthy  of  his 
name. 

3  Lord  Forester's  huntsman.  His  lordship  was  admitted  on  all  hands 
to  have  the  most  perfect  pack,  and  to  have  been  one  of  the  best  riders  in 
England. 

4  Of  those  who  went  so  well  in  this  run,  Lord  Gardner  alone  remained 
to  tell  the  tale.  He  married  Miss  Fortescue,  the  talented  actress,  and 
lived  for  many  years  in  complete  seclusion  in  Hampshire. 


136  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

With  spurs  and  hand-whip  Matuscevitz  plies, — 
O'er  ridge  and  furrow  swiftly  Zodiac  flies  ; 
But  though  his  steed  be  made  of  gallant  stuff, 
"  Tamnation,  Zodiac?  you  will  get  enough  !  " 


Lyne  Stephens  onward  holds  a  steady  course, 
And  Grantham  gallops  faster  than  his  horse. 
Green,  leaning  slightly  forward,  passes  by, 
But  quickly  turning  shows  how  good  his  eye. 
Pinned  in  his  shoulders,  see  old  Johnny  Moore  ; 2 
A  gate  half-open, — Rokeby  slips  before, 
Forgets  his  manners  in  his  love  of  place, 
And  slams  the  swinging  gate  in  Johnny's  face, 
Then,  spurring  onward  with  a  graceful  seat, 
Unlike  Camilla,3  gallops  through  the  wheat. 


Now  some,  alas  !  before  their  horses  fail ; 
Flight  after  flight  succeeds  of  post  and  rail. 
Then  Langton  Hill  appears — the  crowd  decline, 
And  keep  their  riding  'till  they've  had  their  wine. 
Now  Brudenell4  leads,  and  well  does  Langarb  show 
The  rattling  pace  that  strength  with  blood  can  go. 
Wilton  and  Gardner  next  their  station  took, 
And  Derry,6  following  close  on  Billy  Coke. 
Sloping  to  meet  them,  stood  exposed  to  view 
An  awkward  piece  of  timber,  stiff  and  new  ; 
No  other  place  will  do  but  this  alone, 
No  choice  is  left, — go  at  it,  or  go  home. 


1  The  gallant  Count's  own  words.  He  was  celebrated  as  being  the  best 
foreigner  over  a  countiy  then  imported. 

2  This  was  a  jest  at  Mr.  Moore's  rheumatism. 

3  A  lady  who  would  have  had  many  admirers  among  the  farmers  of  the 
present  day  : 

Ilia  vel  intactas  segetis  per  summa  volaret 

Gramina  :  nee  teneras  cursu  la?sisset  aristas. —  Virgil. 

4  Lord  Brudenell  succeeded  his  father  as  Earl  of  Cardigan,  and  gained 
imperishable  fame  by  leading  the  Light  Cavalry  Brigade  in  the  Balaclava 
Charge.  His  memoir,  written  by  the  late  Major  Whyte-Melville,  appeared 
in  the  fifteenth  volume  of  Daily's  Magazine. 

5  Lord  Brudenell's  horse,  well  known  in  that  day. 

6  An  excellent  rider,  and  one  of  the  best  servants  that  ever  came  into  a 
hunting  field. 


LORD    SOUTHAMPTON  137 

Langar  leaps  short,  and  see,  on  high  his  tail, 

Turned  in  the  air,  proclaims  how  strong  the  rail. 

Over  they  go,  together  rise  again, 

For  Brudenell  tight  in  hand  retains  the  rein. 

Here  Leporello  1  fell ;  a  harder  fate 

Attends  his  falling, — where  he  fell,  he  sate. 

Now  Billy  Coke,  who  never  lost  a  chance, 

Down  the  hill's  side  came  rattling  on  Advance, 

And  though  he  saia  the  willows,  still  he  took 

His  line,  and  crammed  him  straight  at  Langton  Brook  ; 

But  vain  the  effort, — gazing  on  the  flood, 

Narcissus-like,  upon  the  bank  he  stood, 

Then  struggling  headlong  fell  ;  and  see,  he's  done  ! 

He  ivashed  his  master,  but  he  lost  the  run. 

More  on  the  left,  see  Wilton  kiss  the  plain ; 

Then  "  Time !  "  to  Pugilist'1  was  called  in  vain. 

Without  a  pause,  by  Bowden  now  they  fly, 

The  pace  so  good  you  scarcely  hear  the  cry  ; 

With  speed  unchecked,  see  bravely  o'er  yon  hill, 

Brudenell  alone  maintains  his  station  still. 

Here's  Dingley  Gorse  ;  "  By  Jove,  they  run  in  view  !  " 

On  Reynard  struggles,  on  the  pack  pursue ; 

The  earths  are  open — will  he  reach  the  cover? 

Who-hoop  !  he  sinks  exhausted ;  all  is  over. 

How  are  the  mighty  fallen  !  lulled  to  rest 

By  fifty  minutes  of  Southampton's  best  ; 

Some  deep  in  ditches  lie,  'midst  brambles  tossed ; 

Others,  more  prudent,  are  by  Farmers  crossed ;3 

These  lost  their  start,  from  those,  the  hounds  had  turned, 

Yet  something  still  from  Brudenell  all  have  learned ; 

And  now  for  once,  a  Melton  field  must  own, 

Fairly  and  cleanly,  they  were  all  "cut  down."4 

The  backward  crowd  are  still  the  first  to  chide, 
For  all  can  censure  where  but  few  can  ride. 
Let  those  blame  others  who  themselves  excel, 
And  pass  their  judgment,  who  have  ridden  well. 


1  Lord  Gardner's  horse. 

2  Lord  Wilton's  horse. 

3  A  very  common  excuse  with  some  people  at  that  time. 

4  A  favourite  expression  of  Lord  Macdonald's,  who  was  one  of  the  most 
promising  riders  of  his  day,  and  very  well  able,  himself,  to  give  a  practical 
illustration  of  it. 


138  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

Each  timid  skirter  thinks  it  is  his  right 

To  hurt  your  feelings  and  display  his  spite. 

If  blest  with  iron  nerves  "  you  ride  for  fame, 

And  seek  in  hunting  nothing  but  a  name  " ; 

If  tender  of  your  person  in  the  chase, 

"  You  love  the  hounds,  but  still  refuse  to  race." 

"  Look  at  him  now  !  "  on  all  sides  it  is  said, 

"  I  always  knew  it,  damn  him,  he's  afraid  ! " 

These  blame  the  system,  master,  hounds,  and  all, 

And  swear  the  huntsman  does  not  like  a  fall ; 

Not  prone  to  cavil  or  to  take  offence, 

Some  in  good  nature  pardon  want  of  sense ; 

And  think  a  smiling  and  un?nea?iing  face 

Can  Ewart  stop,  or  Willis,1  when  they  race. 

On  t'other  tack  some  err,  and  make  their  boast, 

Hounds  run  the  hardest  when  they're  damned  the  most. 

Who  to  Southampton  could  in  judgment  yield  ? 

With  a  light  hand  he  ruled  a  stubborn  field ; 

Now  firm,  now  gentle,  as  occasion  proved, 

And  on  all  sides  alike,  both  feared  and  loved. 

Come  then  again  !  resume  thy  proper  place  ! 

Manage  the  kennel,  and  direct  the  chase ; 

An  equal  balance  keep,  the  skirters  chide, 

And  check  Spring  Captains*  when  they  try  to  ride. 

For  want  of  practice  all  our  talent's  lost ; 

Hounds  never  run,  but  still  the  same  they  cost. 

What  shall  we  do  without  thee  ?  for  I  hear 

The  country's  vacant  in  another  year. 

Old  times,  old  sport  bring  back  !  and  once  again 

Melton  shall  flourish  'neath  thy  golden  reign. 

It  appears  to  have  been  generally  understood  from 
the  first  that  Lord  Southampton  did  not  regard  himself, 
nor  was  he  regarded  by  the  Quorn  men,  as  likely  to  hunt 
the  country  for  any  great  length  of  time.  The  giving 
up   of  Ouorndon    Hall    and   the    removal   to  the    incon- 

1  Two  gentlemen  who  occasioned  more  oaths  to  be  uttered,  one  may 
safely  say,  than  any  two  others  in  England.  While  they  spoiled  sport, 
they  endangered  future  prospects. 

2  A  well-known  Leicestershire  appellation  at  that  time  for  military  gentle- 
men who  arrived  late  in  the  season. 


LORD    SOUTHAMPTON  139 

venient  premises  in  Leicester  was  thought  by  a  good 
many  to  presage  a  change,  and  about  midway  in  the 
season  1830-31  came  the  announcement  that  Lord  South- 
ampton would  give  up  the  hounds  at  the  end  of  the 
season.  Accordingly,  on  Wednesday  the  6th  April  1831 
there  was  held,  at  the  Three  Crowns,  Leicester,  a  meet- 
ing to  take  into  consideration  the  future  hunting  of  the 
country.  The  Marquis  of  Hastings  presided,  and  there 
were  present  Lord  Rancliffe,  Sir  G.  H.  Beaumont,  the 
Reverends  S.  Vere  Dashwood  and  C.  J.  Bewicke, 
Messrs.  C.  Loraine  Smith,  E.  C.  and  E.  B.  Hartopp, 
E.  H.  Cheney,  C.  M.  Phillipps,  C.  Nevill,  H.  Green, 
J.  E.  Wescomb,  E.  B.  Farnham,  H.  and  E.  Dawson, 
J.  B.  Humfrey,  C.  G.  Mundy,  W.  H.  Wilson,  C.  \\r. 
Packe,  J.  King,  M.  Babington,  T.  Walker,  J.  Cradock, 
W.  Martin,  and  R.  Hames  ;  while  letters  of  apology 
were  received  from  Lord  Stamford,  Sir  R.  Bromley,  Sir 
John  Palmer,  Sir  Justinian  Isham,  Sir  F.  G.  Fowke, 
Messrs.  Herrick,  and  several  others,  the  writers  intimat- 
ing their  readiness  to  fall  in  with  the  views  of  the  meeting. 
Sir  Harry  Goodricke,  who  had  for  some  time  hunted  in 
Leicestershire,  had  previously  been  approached,  and  had 
signified  his  willingness  to  take  over  the  country,  stating 
that  should  it  be  offered  to  him  "by  the  resident  gentry 
and  proprietors  of  land  and  coverts,"  he  should  "hold 
himself  accountable  to  those  gentlemen  alone  for  his 
manner  of  hunting  their  country.-'  The  unanimous  resolu- 
tion of  the  meeting  was  that  Sir  Harry  Goodricke's  offer 
be  accepted — he  had  intimated  that  he  would  hunt  the 
country  at  his  own  cost — and  on  the  Marquis  of  Hastings 
conveying  to  Sir  Harry  an  intimation  of  what  had  taken 
place  at  the  meeting,  the  master  elect  wrote  a  gracious 
letter  saying  that  nothing  could  have  given  him  greater 
pleasure  than  the  knowledge  that  the  country-side  had 
been  unanimous  in  offering  him  the  mastership.  He 
would  be  happy  to  accept  it,  and  was  determined  to  give 


140 


THE    QUORN    HUNT 


satisfaction    by    hunting    the  country    in   a  regular   and 
sportsmanlike  manner. 

Some  little  while  after  giving  up  the  Quorn  country, 
Lord  Southampton  retired  to  his  country  seat,  Whittle- 
bury,  and  eventually  hunted  the  Grafton  country  till 
about  1862.  Ten  years  later  (July  1872)  Lord  South- 
ampton died  in  London  at  the  age  of  sixty-nine,  he 
having  been  born  in  1803,  an<^  so  was  twenty-four  years 
old  when  he  elected  to  become  master  of  the  Ouorn. 


CHAPTER    V 

SIR    HARRY    GOODRICKE    (1831-1833) 
MR.    HOLYOAKE    GOODRICKE    (1833-1835) 
MR.    ROWLAND    ERRINGTON    (1835-1838) 


141 


CHAPTER    V 

SIR    HARRY    GOODRICKE 
1831    1833 

WITH  the  resignation  of  Lord  Southampton  came 
the  end  of  the  Ouorn  hounds  under  that  name, 
as  they  were  thenceforward  known  as  Sir  Harry  Good- 
ricke's.  Sir  Harry  of  Ribston  Hall,  Knaresborouo-fi, 
Yorkshire,  who  was  born  on  the  1 6th  September  1797, 
was  the  seventh  baronet  and  last  male  heir  of  his  race, 
being  the  son  of  the  sixth  baronet,  who  died  in  1802. 
His  mother  was  Charlotte  Fortescue,  sister  of  Lord 
Clermont,  and  on  the  death  of  the  latter  Sir  Harry 
came  into  possession  of  something  like  ,£60,000  a  year, 
including  the  fine  Irish  demesnes  of  Ravensdale  and 
Clermont  in  county  Louth  and  Clermont  Lodo-e  in 
Norfolk. 

Sir  Harry  Goodricke's  invincible  passion  for  huntino- 
made  him  a  very  willing  successor  to  Lord  Southampton  ; 
but,  disliking  the  kennels  provided  by  his  predecessor  at 
Humberstone  Gate,  he  promptly  set  about  building  new 
ones  at  Thrussington,  about  five  miles  from  Melton.  No 
expense  was  spared  in  the  undertaking,  but  the  want  of 
experience  in  matters  connected  with  stable  and  kennel 
led  to  partial  failure.  There  is  no  evidence  on  the  point  ; 
but  the  chances  are  that  the  design  was  entrusted  to  an 
architect  who  was  not  well  versed  in  the  details  of  stable 
and  kennel  requirements,   with  the    result  that  while  a 

tolerably  imposing  pile  sprung  up  on  the  left  of  the  road 

143 


i44  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

from  Leicester  to  Melton,  and  nearly  midway  between 
the  two  places,  on  the  bank  of  the  river,  it  was  ill  suited 
to  the  accommodation  of  a  large  hunting  establishment. 
The  stable  was  conceived  upon  a  bad  plan,  while  the 
lodging- rooms  for  hounds  and  the  yards  were  "cribbed, 
cabined,  and  confined,"  and  so  there  was  no  inducement 
for  the  next  master,  whose  turn  came  all  too  soon,  to 
take  to  them. 

The  cub-hunting  season  of  1831  saw  Sir  Harry 
Goodricke  duly  installed  as  the  M.F.  H.,  a  dinner  in 
honour  of  the  event  being  held  at  the  George  Hotel, 
Melton,  on  the  6th  October.  More  than  eighty  guests 
were  present;  Mr.  Inett,  of  Kettleby,  presided  over 
the  festive  gathering,  and  was  supported  by  that  old 
sportsman  Mr.  Marriott.  The  chairman  proposed  the 
health  of  Sir  Harry  in  what  is  called  "  felicitous  terms," 
and  among  the  toasts  of  the  evening  was  "The  im- 
mortal memory  of  Meynell,  the  founder  of  the  Quorn 
Hunt."  After  dinner  Mr.  G.  Marriott,  jun.,  gave  the 
following  song,  written  for  the  occasion  by  the  author  of 
one  or  two  other  hunting  songs  : — 

MELTONIAN    SONG 

That  Sire  of  the  Chase — our  crack  Nimrod,  old  Meynell, 

Once  said  to  a  famed  brother  sportsman  at  Quorn, 
That  "  the  fame  and  the  fun  of  a  Le'stershire  kennel 

Should  cease — when  the  sun  ceased  to  gladden  the  morn." 
He's  gone,  but  each  year  proves  how  true  the  prediction  ; 

Unmarred  is  our  sport — undiminished  our  fame, 
He's  gone,  and  this  day  shows  his  words  were  no  fiction, 

For  "  Hunting  "  and  "  Le'stershire  "  still  mean  the  same. 

Chorus  {after  each  verse). 

Then  round  with  the  bottle,  and  let  it  not  tarry, 

While  we  hail,  while  we  honour,  the  man  of  our  choice ; 

In  a  bumper,  come  pledge  me— the  gallant  Sir  Harry, 
Whom  we  love  in  our  hearts,  as  we  hail  with  our  voice. 


SIR    HARRY    GOODRICKE  145 

Other  masters  we've  had,  in  the  days  of  our  glory — 

Osbaldeston,  Sefton,  Tom  Smith,  and  "  The  Graeme," 
Southampton  the  last,  not  the  least  in  our  story, 

Giving  Melton  its  mainspring  and  Le'stershire  fame. 
And  if  for  a  season  our  joy  has  been  clouded, 

A  day  like  the  present's  too  happy  for  pain  ; 
In  the  prospect  before  us  what  pleasures  are  crowded, 

For  oh,  in  our  Goodricke  we've  Meynell  again. 

The  Coplow  again  shall  be  famous  in  story, 

And  high  be  the  deeds  we  shall  do  from  Seg's  Hill ; 
And  Melton  once  more,  in  the  blaze  of  its  glory, 

Under  Goodricke  shall  nourish — under  Goodricke  shall  fill ; 
Again  shall  our  coverts  like  Courts  be  attended; 

Again  shall  our  "  Field  Days"  boast  many  a  Star, 
The  friends  shall  return  who  have  Melton  befriended, 

Thynne,  Forester,  Kinnaird,  Moore,  Maxse,  and  Maher. 

And  Alvanley  too — shall  Meltonia  forget  thee  ? 

Oh  never — while  wit,  and  while  wine,  have  a  charm  ; 
Thou  too  wilt  return,  blithe  as  ever  we  met  thee, 

And  with  joke,  fun,  and  glee,  still  old  sorrow  disarm  ; 
And  Chesterfield  too,  and  our  honoured  De  Wilton, 

With  Plymouth  and  Stanley,  shall  come  in  the  train, 
And  the  Lord  of  the  Chase,  and  the  Monarch  of  Melton, 

Shall  be  Harry  of  Ribston,  success  to  his  reign. 

Sir  Harry  Goodricke,  the  sixth  baronet,  father  of 
him  concerning  whom  this  chapter  is  written,  was  also 
a  master  of  hounds  in  an  unpretentious  way,  having  in 
conjunction  with  Colonel  Wardle  kept  a  pack  in  Flint- 
shire, with  kennels  at  Colonel  Wardle's  residence,  Harts- 
heath.  Coming  from  Yorkshire,  it  is  certain  that  the 
spirit  of  sport  was  strong  in  both  father  and  son,  and  in 
the  latter  it  showed  itself  at  a  tolerably  early  age.  While 
at  Eton,  possibly  on  Montem  Day,  the  young  Goodricke 
had  to  don  some  kind  of  fancy  dress  and  pass  before 
the  King.  To  the  amazement  of  every  one,  the  future 
M.F.H.  made  his  appearance  in  a  red  hunting-coat 
reaching  down  to  his  heels.  It  was  made  for  his  father's 
whipper-in    in    Flintshire.       This    very    fancy    costume 

K 


146  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

attracted  the  King's  attention,  for  he  was  no  stranger  to 
a  scarlet  coat,  so  he  inquired  who  the  youthful  wearer 
might  be,  and  on  being  told  his  name  remarked  that  he 
was  a  sporting  bred  one. 

As  a  rider  to  hounds  Sir  Harry  Gopdricke  was  quite 
first-rate,  for  not  only  could  he  ride  a  perfect  horse  over 
a  difficult  country,  but  it  is  said  that  he  could  also  get 
along  on  a  rough  one.  At  any  rate  he  figured  as  a  pro- 
minent performer  in  several  long  and  severe  runs. 

In  1824,  when  Mr.  Osbaldeston  was  master  of  the 
Quorn  for  the  first  time,  the  hounds  met  at  Widmerpool 
and  found  in  Walton  Thorns  a  good  fox— the  best  fox 
they  came  upon  during  the  season — which  stood  before 
them  for  an  hour  and  fifty-five  minutes,  there  being  a 
good  scent  all  the  time.  Towards  the  close  of  the  first 
thirty  minutes  many  horses  were  standing  still,  but  "  the 
Squire,"  Sir  Harry,  and  Mr.  Holyoake  continued  in  their 
places  near  the  pack  ;  Sir  Harry's  horse,  however,  lasted 
the  longest.  No  more  than  a  few  days  later  the  hounds 
met  at  Owsthorpe  and  had  an  exceedingly  fast  run  of  an 
hour  and  a  quarter,  and  at  the  end  of  it  Sir  Harry,  the 
only  one  up,  took  the  fox  from  the  hounds  ;  but  on  that 
occasion  he  owed  his  position  to  the  fact  of  having  met 
his  second  horse  near  Six  Hills  ;  while  about  a  couple  of 
years  later  he  was  a  conspicuous  figure  in  Lord  Lons- 
dale's famous  run  from  Launde  Wood,  in  the  bi^eest 
part  of  the  Harborough  country  ;  and  when  he  became 
master  of  the  Quorn  he  rode  harder  than  ever.  Then, 
on  another  day,  when  the  Longford  Brook  came  in  the 
line — it  had  far  overflowed  its  banks — he  rode  into  the 
water,  tumbled  into  the  brook,  and  scrambled  out  on 
the  other  side. 

In  the  hands  of  Sir  Harry  Goodricke  the  Hunt  was 
kept  up  in  first-rate  style.  There  were  upwards  of  fifty 
hunters  in  the  stables  and  about  one  hundred  couples  of 
hounds,  and  the  maintenance  of  these,  together  with  the 


SIR    HARRY     GOODRICKE  147 

payment  of  other  expenses  which  he  took  upon  his  own 
shoulders,  cost  him  something  over  six  thousand  pounds 
a  year.  That  he  was  a  good  sportsman  is  clear  from  a 
story  related  of  him  to  the  effect  that  on  one  very  wet 
evening  he  was  seen  at  Melton  with  a  lame  hound  in  a 
lead,  and  he  was  taking  it  back  to  Thrussington,  a  task 
involving  travelling-  at  a  foot's  pace  over  upwards  of  ten 
miles  of  road. 

With  his  Irish  tenants  Sir  Harry  was  very  popular, 
for  he  made  it  a  point  always  to  pass  some  part  of  the 
year  on  his  Irish  property.  In  Leicestershire,  however, 
there  was  a  rumour  that  at  one  time  the  master  of  the 
Quorn  was  not  in  high  favour,  because  he  had  spoken  in 
somewhat  uncomplimentary  terms  of  the  horses  bred  by 
the  farmers  in  his  hunt.  So  far  as  can  be  discovered,  the 
facts  are  that  Sir  Harry,  who  was  always  superexcellently 
mounted,  was  once  approached  by  a  Leicestershire  farmer 
who  had  a  hunter  to  sell.  The  horse  was  not  up  to  the 
future  master's  high  standard,  and  Sir  Harry  is  said  to 
have  ventured  the  remark  that  for  so  good  a  country  the 
horses  bred  therein  were  not  up  to  the  standard  which 
might  have  been  expected  ;  upon  this  was  based  the 
story  of  his  unpopularity. 

If,  however,  there  was  any  friction,  it  soon  dis- 
appeared, for  when  he  came  to  hunt  the  country  no  man 
could  have  stood  higher  in  the  farmers'  estimation. 

Concerning  Sir  Harry  Goodricke's  kennel  there 
appears  to  be  some  uncertainty.  It  has  been  generally 
supposed  that  Sir  Harry  took  over  and  kept,  as  he  found 
them,  Lord  Southampton's  hounds.  As  before  remarked, 
however,  Lord  Southampton  had  the  nucleus  of  a  very 
good  pack  in  the  hounds  Mountford  brought  with  him 
from  Oakley  (Lord  Tavistock's),  whereas  Sir  Harry 
Goodricke  admitted  the  truth  of  the  criticism  passed  on 
his  kennel  to  the  effect  that  his  hounds  were  not  worthy 
of  Leicestershire  ;    but   he  declared  that  he  would  per- 


148  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

severe  until  his  kennel  was  satisfactory,  if  not  perfect 
and  as  Sir  Harry  was  rather  a  judge  of  a  horse  and  a 
riding  man  than  a  hound  man,  the  confession  would  seem 
to  imply  that  the  standard  of  the  hounds  was  not  high. 
To  reconcile  these  two  statements  is  not  easy  ;  but,  from 
what  can  be  made  out,  it  would  appear  that  Sir  Harry 
Goodricke  sold  Lord  Southampton's  pack  (including  the 
Oakley  division)  to  Mr.  Russell  of  the  Warwickshire, 
and  bought  the  hounds  of  Lord  Petre,  who  gave  up  his 
Essex  country  in  1831,  and  we  find  one  sportsman  com- 
plaining that  "  Lord  Petre's  hounds  ill  supply  the  place 
of  those  he  parted  with."  At  the  end  of  his  first  season, 
however,  Sir  Harry  was  able  to  buy  the  hounds  of  Mr. 
Shaw,  when  he,  in  consequence  of  the  extent  to  which 
foxes  were  killed,  gave  up  the  country  he  hunted  from 
Lichfield  to  the  outskirts  of  Birmingham  ;  while  Sir 
Harry  also  bought  Mr.  Saville's  draft  and  twenty  couples 
out  of  Norfolk  belonging  either  to  Sir  Jacob  Astley  or 
Mr.  Hill. 

If,  however,  the  hounds  themselves  left  something  to 
be  desired,  they  managed  in  Mountford's  hands  to  show 
some  very  good  sport ;  while,  under  so  popular  a  master 
as  Sir  Harry  Goodricke,  rank  and  fashion  set  towards 
Leicestershire  as  much  as  ever.  The  Old  Club  at  Melton 
claimed  for  its  members  Mr.  T.  Moore,  Sir  J.  Musgrave, 
Mr.  Val  Maher,  and  Lord  Forester.  Sir  Harry  Good- 
ricke, Mr.  Gilmour,  and  Lord  Gardner  kept  house 
together ;  Mr.  Stanley  and  Mr.  Errington,  who  were 
brothers,  had  a  joint  establishment,  as  also  had  Lords 
Rokeby  and  Alvanley  ;  while  Melton  Lodge  held  Lord 
Kinnaird,  the  Messrs.  Maxwell,  Mr.  Fairfax,  Mr.  White, 
Mr.  Ewart,  and  Lord  Plymouth  ;  Lord  and  Lady  Sarah 
Ingestre,  Sir  John  Kaye,  and  Colonel  Drummond  housed 
themselves  at  Leicester,  and  most  places  within  reach  of 
hounds  had  their  visitors.  Over  Melton  itself  a  great 
change  was  in  progress.     Only  a  few  years  before  it  was 


SIR    HARRY    GOODRICKE  149 

rather  a  rackety  place  ;  men  left  their  womankind  at 
home,  and,  like  their  grooms,  came  to  Melton  without 
what  advertisements  call  encumbrances.  The  bottle 
circulated  freely  after  dinner,  and  men  gambled  a  good 
deal. 

A  few  years  before  Sir  Harry  Goodricke  took  the 
country,  ladies,  though  they  did  not  all  hunt,  began  to 
come  to  Leicestershire,  Lady  Wilton  being  one  of  the 
first  ;  and  as  her  position  in  society  and  her  amiability 
rendered  her  a  leader  of  women,  others  hastened  to 
follow  her  example,  and  her  husband  at  once  set  about 
enlarging  his  house.  Lady  Stormont,  Lady  Edward 
Thynne,  Mrs.  Drummond,  and  Mrs.  Lloyd  were  of 
the  number  of  those  who  wintered  at  Melton,  and  the 
magnetic  influence  of  female  society  completely  revo- 
lutionised Melton. 

Rather  bad  luck  attended  Sir  Harry  at  the  opening 
of  his  first  season,  for  Mountford,  his  huntsman,  was  not 
able  to  take  his  place  in  the  field,  owing,  it  is  said,  to 
some  affection  of  the  throat,  induced  by  constant  holloa- 
ing and  over-exertion  ;  so,  in  the  absence  of  his  chief, 
Will  Derry,  the  first  whipper-in  (he  had  formerly  dis- 
charged the  same  duty  with  Mr.  Musters)  carried  the 
horn.  But  though  a  satisfactory  lowim  /enens,he  was  not 
thought  to  be  Mountford's  equal.  On  the  21st  Novem- 
ber 1 83 1,  Mountford  being  then  laid  up,  the  hounds 
met  at  Brooksby,  a  mile  or  two  on  the  Leicester  side  of 
Kirby  Gate,  the  familiar  fixture  selected  by  Henry 
Aiken  to  represent  "  The  Meet "  in  his  well-known 
picture.  Some  persons  then  travelled  to  the  covert- side 
like  the  man  described  by  "  Nimrod  "  in  his  Quarterly 
Review  article  as  "  lolling  in  his  chaise  and  four."  More 
than  one  noble  lord  drove  up  with  his  four-in-hand  ; 
while  well-turned-out  phaetons,  buggys,  and  tilburys 
helped  to  swell  the  collection  of  vehicles,  and  hacks  of 
the  kind  represented  by  Mr.  Ackerman  in   "  My  Stud  " 


150  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

carried  not  a  few  to  Brooksby.  The  day's  sport,  how- 
ever, did  not  amount  to  much.  A  fox  was  soon  found 
at  Cream  Gorse  and  as  quickly  lost,  and  a  second  fox 
was  lost  after  a  good  thirty-five  minutes,  with  only  one 
check,  via  Great  and  Little  Dalby,  and  then  towards  Lees- 
thorpe,  beyond  which  place  the  fox  ran  the  hounds  out 
of  scent.  Thursday,  February  25,  1832,  saw  the  hounds 
at  Norton-by-Galby.  Glen  Gorse  gave  a  fox  directly, 
and  after  running  by  Stretton  Hall,  Swadborough  Lane, 
Bushby,  and  Scraptoft  Gardens,  the  fox  turned  for 
Humberstone  village  ;  and  after  going  back  to  Thurnley 
and  eventually  to  Glen  Gorse,  he  was  killed  after  a 
capital  run  of  an  hour  and  a  quarter,  with  no  check  to 
speak  of.  Almost  a  twelvemonth  later,  that  is  to  say 
on  the  27th  February  1833,  the  hounds  met  at  Six 
Hills,  always  a  favourite  portion  of  the  Ouorn  country. 
Finding  a  fox  at  the  Curate,  hounds  ran  him  by 
Willoughby  village,  near  Wymeswold,  Munday's  Gorse, 
and  Walton  Thorns.  Thence  the  line  lay  towards 
Thrussington  Wolds,  Ragdale,  Schoby  Scholes,  and 
Lord  Aylesford's  Gorse  ;  Grimston  was  left  on  the 
right,  and  the  fox,  running  by  Old  Dalby  and  Nether 
Broughton,  was  eventually  rolled  over  near  Stapleford, 
after  a  good  run  of  two  hours. 

A  somewhat  curious  circumstance  happened  during 
Sir  Harry  Goodricke's  mastership.  Several  times  had 
he  run  foxes  to  ground  near  Widmerpool,  and  at  last 
he  determined  at  whatever  trouble  to  get  out  another 
which  had  taken  refuge  in  the  same  place.  Spades  and 
pickaxes  were  brought,  and  digging  operations  on  an 
extended  scale  began.  A  large  stone  drain  was  broken 
into  and  the  run  fox  duly  driven  out ;  but  in  the  same 
drain  were  the  skeletons  of  nine  other  foxes.  Up  to  that 
time  it  had  been  supposed  that  it  was  the  same  fox  which 
had  so  often  betaken  himself  to  this  favourite  shelter. 

Another  instance  of  man  making  the  town  is  to  be 


SIR    HARRY    GOODRICKE  151 

found  in  the  extent  to  which  Melton  was  at  this  time 
(^S)  patronised.  A  contributor  to  the  Leicester 
Journal  took  the  trouble  to  make  the  round  of  the 
Melton  stables,  and  found  that  no  fewer  than  450  horses 
were  quartered  in  the  district.  Sir  Harry  Goodricke 
headed  the  list  with  52  ;  then  came  Lord  Forester  38, 
Lord  Thynne  26,  Lord  Wilton  24,  Mr.  Stanley  18, 
Lord  Gardner  17,  Lord  Kinnaird  and  Mr.  Etherington 
16  each,  Sir  F.  Johnston  and  Mr.  Stephens  14  apiece, 
and  there  were  several  owners  of  smaller  studs. 

On  one  day  on  which  there  was  but  little  scent, 
hounds  found  a  fox  but  soon  came  to  a  check.  One 
of  the  whippers-in,  however,  viewed  him  a  field  or  two 
ahead,  and  cap  in  hand  holloaed  on  the  hounds,  riding 
on  meantime  in  the  fox's  wake.  The  hounds,  however, 
were  a  long  time  in  coming  on.  The  sight  of  the  gallop- 
ing whipper-in  was  quite  sufficient  to  cause  the  field  to 
begin  to  gallop  too,  and  on  they  came,  some  before  the 
hounds  and  some  after  them.  In  this  fashion  they  went 
for  about  a  mile,  and  then  Will  Derry,  who  was  carrying 
the  horn  in  the  absence  of  Mountford,  who  was  laid  up, 
arrived  with  the  hounds,  giving  some  hearty  curses  to 
the  men  who  had  ridden  on  in  advance  of  the  pack  ; 
whereupon  Lord  Alvanley  is  reported  to  have  exclaimed, 
"Curse  these  infernal  hounds!  they  always  spoil  sport ; 
what  a  capital  hunt  we  should  have  had  if  it  had  not 
been  for  them."  A  historian  of  the  time  wrote  that  he 
saw  the  members  of  the  Quorn  field  after  a  run,  and 
that  it  would  have  puzzled  a  stranger  to  know  the  colour 
of  their  coats,  they  were  so  completely  bedaubed  from 
the  number  of  falls;  "but,"  continues  the  writer,  "I 
never  saw  fellows  mind  them  so  little." 

That   Sir  Harry  Goodricke   did  not  mind   riding  a 
rough  horse,  the  following  anecdote  proves  : — 

"  A  friend  of  mine  was  standing  one  day  in  the  yard 
at    Melton   when   Sir   Harry's    horse   came   in   with   his 


152  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

groom  on  him.  He  was  a  great  big  thoroughbred  one, 
but  there  was  something  sulky-looking  about  his  head. 
Sir  Harry  had  ridden  him  during  the  first  part  of  the 
day,  and  his  appearance  was  such  as  to  make  my  friend 
inquire  if  he  often  came  home  in  that  state  ?  A  person 
standing  by  said,  '  Not  often  so  bad  as  that,  but  I 
remember  being  in  the  yard  on  one  day  when  Sir  Harry 
rode  in  on  the  same  horse  and  in  much  the  same  state, 
and  on  my  remarking  it  he  said,  "Yes,  old"  (I  forget 
the  horse's  name)  "has  been  at  his  old  tricks  again; 
he  has  been  eleven  times  on  his  head  to-day.' '  The 
writer  then  moralised  :  "  Now  when  you  consider  that 
this  gallant  horseman  could  have  the  pick  of  the  best 
horses,  money  being  no  object,  it  does  seem  strange  that 
he  should  ride  such  a  vicious  brute  ;  but  he  has  nerve 
enough  for  anything.  This  horse  was  a  capital  hunter 
when  he  was  in  the  humour." 

Sir  Harry  Goodricke,  whose  liberality  and  kindly 
manner  endeared  him  to  all,  had,  since  his  accession  to 
the  mastership,  so  completely  thrown  his  whole  heart 
and  soul  into  hunting  the  country,  and  had  expressed 
himself  as  desirous  of  making  so  many  improvements,  that 
the  era  of  short  masterships  which  had  so  prevailed  since 
the  death  of  Mr.  Meynell  was  regarded  as  over.  Had 
all  been  well,  these  expectations  would  doubtless  have 
been  verified  ;  but  shortly  after  the  close  of  the  season 
1832-33  there  came  over  the  Quorn  country  what  was 
rightly  called  "a  thundering  blow  to  fox-hunting,"  that 
thundering  blow  being  nothing  less  than  the  unexpected 
death  of  Sir  Harry  Goodricke.  He  was  one  of  those 
happy  men  for  whom  each  season  as  it  came  round  pre- 
sented an  attraction.  When  the  hounds  had  met  for  the 
last  time  in  England,  it  was  his  custom  to  go  to  his  estate 
in  Ireland,  where  he  indulged  in  otter-hunting  (of  which 
sport  he  was  passionately  fond),  until  the  grouse-shooting 
in  August   called  him   to  Scotland,  where  he  remained 


SIR    HARRY    GOODRICKE  153 

until  it  was  time  to  shoot  partridges  on  his  Yorkshire 
property,  and  after  a  short  sojourn  there  he  came  south 
for  hunting  again.  At  the  close  of  the  season  1832-33 
Sir  Harry  went  as  usual  to  Ireland  for  otter-hunting, 
caught  a  bad  cold,  and  was  dead  in  forty-eight  hours. 
His  body  was  brought  over  to  Yorkshire,  and  was 
interred  in  the  family  vault  at  Ribston  on  Wednesday 
the  4th  of  September  1833  ;  while  about  the  same  time 
there  died  his  great  friend  and  fellow-sportsman,  Lord 
Plymouth,  a  hard-riding  follower  of  the  Quorn,  who,  like 
Sir  Harry,  was  cut  off  in  the  prime  of  life. 


154  THE    QUORN    HUNT 


MR.    HOLYOAKE    GOODRICKE 

i833-l835 

SOME  of  the  estates  were  entailed  in  favour  of  the 
members  of  the  Clermont  family  ;  but  nearly  all 
the  property  over  which  Sir  H.  Goodricke  had  a 
power  of  disposal,  including  the  horses,  hounds,  and 
all  chattels,  he  left  to  his  schoolfellow  and  life-long 
friend,  Mr.  Francis  Lyttelton  Holyoake,  who  was  pro- 
bably as  much  surprised  as  was  the  rest  of  the  world 
at  the  turn  things  had  taken.  Mr.  Holyoake  married 
Miss  Payne,  of  Sulby  Abbey,  a  sister  of  the  late  Mr. 
George  Payne,  of  racing  renown,  and  twice  master  of 
the  Pytchley  hounds.  Mr.  Holyoake  at  once  made 
himself  responsible  for  the  carrying  on  of  the  hounds 
durino"  the  approaching  season,  but  as  his  health  did  not 
then  permit  of  his  being  out  himself,  the  management 
was  delegated  to  Mr.  Greene,  of  Rolleston,  and  the 
pack  was  to  be  out  four  days  a  week. 

Mr.  Holyoake,  who  was  the  eldest  son  of  Mr.  Francis 
Holyoake,  of  Tettenhall,  was  at  one  time  about  the 
hardest  and  fastest  man  over  a  country  for  a  short  time 
that  Leicestershire  had  ever  seen — in  fact,  the  manner 
in  which  he  would  gallop  and  jump,  especially  when 
mounted  on  Baronet,  his  favourite  horse,  sometimes  led 
him  into  the  indiscretion  of  overriding  hounds. 

The  season  1833-34  necessarily  opened  amid  some- 
what mournful  surroundings,  for  there  was  no  one  who 
did  not  sincerely  lament  the  death  of  the  late  master. 
There  was,  however,  one  ludicrous  circumstance  in  con- 


MR.    HOLYOAKE    GOODRICKE  155 

nection  with  Mr.  Holyoake's  first  season.  Some  one 
from  Nottingham  went  out  with  the  Ouorn  from  Bunny 
Park  and  went  with  the  hounds  when  they  drew  Deep- 
dale,  where  they  found  a  fox  which  was  eventually  lost. 
At  Kinoulton  stone  pits  the  hounds  flushed  a  woodcock, 
which  was  marked  down  by  the  gentleman  in  question, 
whose  love  for  shooting  was  apparently  greater  than  his 
keenness  for  hunting.  Having  marked  down  the  bird, 
he  remarked  to  some  one  near  him,  "  That  woodcock 
shall  be  mine  in  a  short  time,"  and  he  was  as  good  as  his 
word.  He  left  the  hounds,  rode  back  a  mile,  put  up  his 
horse,  borrowed  a  gun  which  had  been  loaded  for  a  couple 
of  months,  returned  on  foot  to  the  place  where  he  had 
marked  down  the  woodcock,  flushed  him,  and  with  a  mas- 
terly shot  carried  out  his  previously  announced  intention 
of  making  him  his  own.  He  then  walked  back  for  his 
horse,  picked  up  the  hounds  again,  and,  as  the  Notting- 
ham Journal  said,  "  finished  the  day's  diversion  like  a 
true   British  sportsman." 

Monday  the  17th  February  1834  saw  Mr.  Holyoake 
Goodricke's  hounds — he  had  by  that  time  taken  the  name 
of  Goodricke,  and  was  subsequently  made  a  baronet — at 
Brooksby,  where  a  capital  run  came  off  from  Cream 
Gorse.  Hounds  settled  down  at  once,  running  very  fast 
for  Ashby  Pasture  and  Thorpe  Trussells,  and  then  to  the 
left  to  Burrough  Hill,  through  Little  Dalby  plantation, 
and  thence  for  Leesthorpe,  running  to  Jericho  Lodo-e, 
and  to  the  right  of  Bury  Gorse,  and  near  to  Stapleford. 
The  fox  then  crossed  the  river  Eye  and  the  Oakham 
Canal,  and  leaving  Brentingby  on  the  left,  passed  Treeby 
Village  and  went  on  through  Treeby  Wood,  Waltham 
Thorns,  and  Newman's  Covert  up  to  Garthorpe  Spinneys 
to  the  left  of  Sproxton  Thorns,  and  so  to  Buckminster 
Park,  "where  two  gentlemen  of  the  Hunt  scaled  the 
park  wall  and  were  up  at  the  death  of  the  gallant  fox, 
after  a  run  of  two  hours  and  a  half."     The  distance  was 


156  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

said  to  be  twenty-two  miles,  and  George  Mountford,  the 
huntsman,  came  in  for  great  kudos  for  the  manner  in 
which  he  handled  his  hounds  during  what  must  have 
been  a  tolerably  fast  run  ;  for  Lady  Wilton,  riding  a 
thoroughbred  horse,  could  get  no  further  than  within 
two  miles  of  Buckminster  Park,  and  the  only  members  of 
the  field  up  at  the  finish  were  Mr.  Holyoake  Goodricke, 
Lord  Kinnaird,  Lord  Wilton,  and  Lord  Macdonald — all 
Meltonians  ;  the  last-named  was  riding  his  favourite  grey 
Peruvian,  whose  turn  generally  came  when  a  run  longer 
than  usual  was  brought  off. 

During  Mr.  Holyoake's  mastership — I  ought  perhaps 
to  call  him  Mr.  Holyoake  Goodricke — the  Quorn  Hunt 
lost  a  good  sportsman  in  Mr.  James  Ellar,  of  Wymes- 
wold,  who,  beginning  his  hunting  career  in  the  days  of 
Mr.  Meynell,  strenuously  preserved  foxes  and  bred  good 
hunters  up  to  the  day  of  his  death,  which  occurred  in 
August  1834,  while  his  hospitality  was  extended  to  every 
hunting  man  whose  road  home  lay  by  his  house.  Mr. 
Ellar  was  apparently  very  fortunate  in  his  horse-breeding 
experience.  Some  of  the  best  of  the  Quorn  stud  came 
from  his  stable  ;  Mr.  Delme  Radcliffe  bought  one  or  two 
for  George  IV.,  while  he  generally  sold  one  a  year  for  a 
large  sum  to  Lord  Clanwilliam.  As  a  raconteur  of  the 
chase  he  was  unrivalled,  his  wonderful  memory  enabling 
him  to  recall  every  famous  run  and  every  man,  horse, 
and  hound  which  figured  in  them.  When  he  first  beean 
to  hunt  there  was  scarcely  a  fence  or  drain  in  Leicester- 
shire ;  and  on  one  occasion  he  remarked  to  Lord  Robert 
Grosvenor,  in  the  course  of  a  gallop,  "My  lord,  you  and 
I  were  both  in  the  long  run  from  this  spot  forty-eight 
years  ago,  when  we  had  seven  horses  stone  blind."  In 
a  very  famous  run  of  five  hours  and  a  quarter,  for  so  long 
talked  about,  he  was  one  of  the  three  survivors.  In 
Mr.  Ellar's  early  days  "blooding"  the  youngsters  was  a 
recognised  custom,   on   the  glories   of  which  he  would 


MR.    HOLYOAKE    GOODRICKE  157 

dilate  freely  at  his  own  fireside.  This  rite  was 
solemnised  after  a  good  run  ending  with  a  kill,  "when," 
as  he  affirmed,  "all  the  colts  were  obliged  to  offer  up  a 
bowl  of  punch  as  a  libation  to  Diana,  stirring  it  with  the 
victim's  pad  " — a  truly  nasty  operation. 

Like  many  another  good  sportsman  who  lived  to  a 
ripe  old  age — Mr.  Ellar  was  seventy-two  when  he  died — 
he  was  forced  to  exchange  the  saddle  for  wheels,  and 
his  intimate  knowledge  of  the  country  enabled  him  to 
see  a  good  deal  of  the  sport.  In  the  month  of  January 
before  his  death  a  fox  was  found  in  Munday's  Gorse,  and 
Mr.  Ellar  was  the  first  to  view  him  away.  He  stood  up 
in  his  gig  and  gave  a  right  good  halloa,  which  quickly 
brought  hounds  on  the  line.  At  that  moment  up  rode 
Colonel  Cheney,  a  Waterloo  man,  and  so  delighted  was 
he  to  see  an  old  brother  sportsman  that  he  grasped  Mr. 
Ellar's  hand  with  considerable  fervour.  Whether  it  was 
owing  to  the  warmth  of  handshaking,  the  restiveness  of 
Colonel  Cheney's  horse,  or  the  fact  that  Mr.  Ellar  forgot 
that  he  was  not  in  the  saddle  is  not  known  ;  but  at  any 
rate  the  gig  turned  over,  and  Mr.  Ellar  was  underneath. 
Although  the  fox  had  gone  away,  a  number  of  men 
remained  behind  to  extricate  the  veteran  sportsman  from 
his  dangerous  position,  and  one  and  all  were  delighted 
to  hear  him  exclaim  from  under  his  vehicle,  "Zounds, 
colonel,  if  you  charge  me  so  again,  you  will  send  me  to 
Davy's  locker,  as  you  did  those  French  Invincibles." 
The  victim  was  happily  unhurt,  and  when  he  again  met 
the  hounds  a  few  days  later  he  came  in  for  quite  a  shower 
of  congratulations. 

Mr.  Ellar  had,  however,  one  foible.  By  virtue  of 
being  about  the  oldest  member  of  the  Hunt,  he  con- 
sidered that  he  always  had  the  right  to  be  noticed  in  the 
field,  and  if  at  any  time  he  considered  that  he  had  been 
slighted  in  this  respect  by  any  one,  he  immediately 
turned  his  horse's  head  towards  home,  declaring  that  his 


158  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

coverts  should  be  cut  up,  the  foxes  sent  to  Belvoir,  and 
that  no  Meltonian  should  ever  a^ain  set  foot  in  his 
house.  Yet  somehow  or  other  the  next  fixture  saw 
him  in  his  accustomed  place.  Some  fancied  slight  of 
this  kind  caused,  after  years  of  intimacy,  an  estrange- 
ment between  Mr.  Ellar  and  Lord  Rancliffe ;  but  the 
latter,  on  hearing  that  the  old  sportsman  was  ill,  stopped 
his  carriage  at  his  door,  sent  in  a  quantity  of  hothouse 
grapes,  peaches,  and  other  things,  and  begged  once  more 
to  shake  the  old  sportsman  by  the  hand.  Gladly  did 
Mr.  Ellar  accede  to  the  request,  and  the  meeting  affected 
him  greatly. 

In  the  course  of  the  season  1834-35  the  rumour  that 
Mr.  Holyoake  would  resign  the  hounds  was  not  long  in 
receiving  confirmation,  and  it  was  reported  that  Lord 
Kinnaird  would  take  them,  and  give  ^"3000  towards  the 
expenses,  provided  the  country  made  up  the  rest,  but  in 
this  case  there  was  a  chance  of  the  pack  reverting  to  its 
old  name — the  Quorn.  Indeed,  during  Mr.  Holyoake 
Goodricke's  last  season  he  took  a  subscription,  Lord 
Kinnaird  being  one  of  his  greatest  supporters. 

The  first  day  of  the  season  (1834-35)  took  place  as 
usual  at  Kirby  Gate,  but  the  September  and  October 
had  been  so  dry  that  it  was  scarcely  safe  to  ride  when 
the  regular  season  began.  The  cub-hunting  time  had 
brought  with  it  only  moderate  success,  and  at  Kirby 
Gate  the  muster  was  unusually  small,  though  just  after- 
wards some  welcome  rain  fell,  when  sport  very  mate- 
rially revived. 

When  runners  were  invented  we  know  not,  but  at 
this  time  they  were  well-known  appendages  to  most 
hunts,  and  one  contributor  to  a  local  newspaper,  who 
had  previously  advocated  the  publication  of  accounts  of 
good  runs,  wrote  to  that  paper  drawing  attention  to  the 
fact  that  J.  Buttress,  of  Skeffington,  who  was  well  known 
to  old   Meltonians   on  account  of  his  having  for  many 


MR.    HOLYOAKE    GOODRICKE  159 

years  done  a  good  deal  of  the  earth-stopping  for  the 
Ouorn  and  Cottesmore,  and  run  with  the  hounds,  was 
too  deserving  a  character  to  be  left  out  of  notice  while 
others  were  being  mentioned.  Buttress  appears  to  have 
been  one  of  the  best  as  well  as  the  most  popular  of  his 
calling.  It  was  said  that  he  stopped  more  earths,  opened 
more  gates,  directed  more  men  on  their  way  home  than 
any  other  man  in  the  county  of  Leicestershire  ;  and  there 
is  some  reason  to  believe  that  he  made  a  very  tidy  living 
out  of  it,  although,  at  the  same  time,  the  amount  of  exer- 
tion of  running  four,  five,  and  six  days  a  week  should 
have  sufficed  to  gain  more  than  a  competence  at  any 
trade  which  he  might  have  been  capable  of  following. 

In  April  1S35  the  Meltonian  hounds  (as  they  were 
called),  then  still  in  the  hands  of  Mr.  Holyoake,  met  by 
invitation  at  Belvoir  Castle,  where  an  enormous  field 
assembled.  It  was  quite  a  function.  At  noon  the  Duke 
of  Rutland's  carriage,  drawn  by  four  horses  with  pos- 
tillions, drew  up  at  the  fixture,  but  the  sport  does  not 
appear  to  have  been  very  grand,  as  might  be  supposed 
from  the  time  of  year.  It  is  true  three  hours'  hunting 
resulted  in  the  death  of  a  couple  of  foxes,  but  the  hounds 
were  very  little  in  the  open,  and  the  third  fox  found 
saved  his  brush.  Among  those  present  were  Namick 
Pasha  and  his  secretary,  the  pair  appearing  to  enjoy  the 
novel  surroundings  very  much.  They  managed  to  be  in 
at  the  death  we  are  told,  but,  as  already  stated,  this 
hardly  involved  any  very  great  display  of  horsemanship. 
Lord  and  Lady  Chesterfield,  Lord  E.  Wortley,  Lord 
Granby,  Lord  R.  Manners,  and  Lord  Rokeby  were  also 
present ;  while  among  the  spectators  who  were  content  to 
follow  on  wheels  was  Madame  Cardoro,  the  cantatrice, 
who  had  broken  her  journey  from  York  to  stay  at 
Belvoir  Castle,  where  after  dinner  she  "delighted  all 
the  large  party  of  distinguished  persons  by  singing." 
This   was   about  the   last   of  the   season    1834-35,  and 


i6o  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

at    its    close    Mr.    Holyoake    Goodricke    resigned    the 
hounds. 

During  Mr.  Holyoake  Goodricke's  last  season  the 
hounds  had  a  good  run  from  Lowesby  Hall,  where  lived 
the  Marquis  of  Waterford  and  some  friends.  A 
Russian  fox,  said  to  have  been  one  of  those  imported 
by  Mr.  White,  was  found  in  John  o'  Gaunt  covert,  and 
he  gave  a  capital  run  of  thirty-nine  minutes  without  a 
check  ;  and  by  great  exaggeration  the  distance  is  said  to 
have  been  ten  miles,  when  the  "  Czar,"  as  the  Russian 
fox  was  called,  squatted  in  a  furrow,  and  the  whole  pack 
passed  over  him  ;  but  he  was  killed  just  afterwards. 
Lord  Waterford  went  from  start  to  finish  as  hard  as  he 
could  pelt,  and  killed  his  first  horse  Lancet  at  the  end 
of  a  racing  twenty  minutes.  For  the  first  time  in  his  life 
he  refused  a  fence.  Lord  Waterford  jumped  off  to  see 
what  was  the  matter,  and  in  a  few  minutes  the  horse 
was  in  extremis.  "It  was  not  the  value  of  the  horse  that 
I  cared  about,"  said  the  marquis,  "but  the  loss  of  time." 
A  critic  of  the  time  wrote  that  it  was  a  pity  there  was 
not  a  little  more  discretion  mixed  up  with  his  lordship's 
valour. 

Sir  Holyoake  Goodricke,  as  he  then  was,  died  at  the 
close  of  1865,  and  one  of  his  biographers — one  who  did 
not  always  observe  the  precept  De  mortuis,  &c. — wrote  : 
"  It  must  have  been  many  years  since  Sir  Francis 
Goodricke  put  on  a  red  coat ;  and  '  blazer '  as  he  was 
for  five-and-twenty  minutes,  there  never  was  one  atom 
of  real  sporting  blood  in  him.  How  a  cool  hand  like  Sir 
Harry  could  ever  have  made  him  his  heir,  even  in  a  huff, 
and  expected  him  to  carry  on  the  Ouorn  hounds,  passes 
all  belief.  The  most  unfortunate  part  of  the  business 
was,  that  the  gentleman  to  whom  the  estates  were  left 
by  the  first  will  was  informed  after  Sir  Harry's  death 
that  he  was  the  heir,  and  then  a  second  will  turned  up. 
For  a  calculating  head,  nothing  beat  Mr.   Holyoake  in 


MR.    HOLYOAKE    GOODRICKE  161 

his  young  days,  and  old  Meltonians  talk  yet  of  seeing 
him  come  dashing  up  to  the  covert-side  in  his  phaeton, 
when  he  had  barely  £Soo  a  year,  and  compare  it  with 
the  humble  style  of  Lord  Plymouth,  who  had  such 
abundance.  That  Mr.  Holyoake  was  no  sportsman 
unfortunately  appears  to  be  true.  He  owned  an  estate 
in  Warwickshire,  and  when  he  went  down  there  the 
first  question  he  asked  the  old  keeper  was,  "How  many 
foxes  have  you  killed?"  adding,  "I  won't  have  them 
here  ;  "  and  the  old  man  used  to  pull  some  pads  out  of  his 
pocket  and  show  them  ;  but  it  is  to  be  hoped  that  the 
same  trophies  did  duty  on  several  occasions.  This  I  have 
on  the  very  best  authority,  and  there  is  no  doubt  at  all 
that  Mr.  Holyoake,  though  tremendously  down  upon 
any  one  in  Leicestershire  whose  coverts  were  drawn 
blank,  was  not  much  of  a  sportsman  at  heart.  Nor  is 
his  an  isolated  case,  for  I  have  known  of  a  master  of 
hounds  who  would  not  tolerate  foxes  in  a  neighbouring 
country  where  he  had  shooting ;  while  another  well- 
known  individual  who  wrote  on  sport  would  not  preserve 
foxes  because  he  said  that  his  was  not  a  hunting  country, 
yet  hounds  regularly  draw  his  coverts. 

Although  Mr.  Holyoake  Goodricke  was  not  esteemed 
much  of  a  sportsman,  he  is  said  to  have  been  courteous 
in  the  field,  and  to  have  "blown  up"  only  one  man,  and 
that  was  a  farmer  for  riding  over  wheat  ;  but  he  was 
soon  set  right  by  the  farmer's  reply,  "  I  am  sure  Master 
Holyoake  is  the  last  person  to  be  offended  this  year" 

(■835)- 


162  THE    QUORN    HUNT 


MR.    ROWLAND    ERRINGTON 

1835-1838 

AS  already  mentioned,  the  sudden  and  untimely  death 
L  of  Sir  Harry  Goodricke  was  a  sad  blow  to  the 
Ouorn  country,  and  as  Mr.  Francis  Holyoake  had  suc- 
ceeded to  so  large  a  portion  ol  Sir  Harry's  fortune,  he 
could  do  no  less,  unwell  though  he  was,  than  keep 
up  the  Hunt,  at  least  until  things  had  settled  down. 
After  his  two  seasons  had  expired,  he  resigned  the 
Ouorn  country  into  the  hands  of  Mr.  Rowland  Erring- 
ton,  a  good  sportsman,  and  in  every  way  an  estimable 
gentleman. 

He  was  born  a  Stanley  —  at  Hooton  in  Cheshire; 
and  in  his  veins  there  flowed  some  of  the  bluest  and 
oldest  blood  in  that  pleasant  county.  His  father  was 
Sir  Thomas  Massey  Stanley,  the  ninth  baronet.  The 
subject  of  this  chapter  inherited  when  quite  a  boy  the 
extensive  estates  of  Mr.  Henry  Errington,  his  maternal 
a-rand-uncle,  whose  name  he  took.  The  father  of  Mr. 
(afterwards  Sir)  Rowland  Errington  was  closely  allied 
with  the  turf,  and  it  may  be  remembered  that  such 
horses  as  Picaroon,  Apothecary,  and  Gasparoni  are 
found  mentioned  in  connection  with  his  name,  when 
the  Hooton  colours  were  so  often  to  the  front.  Mr. 
Rowland  Errington,  however,  was  by  choice  a  hunt- 
ing man,  and  as  master  carried  on  the  Quorn  hounds 
up  to  their  highest  traditions,  while  in  his  younger  days 
few  could  beat  him  over  a  country. 

He  succeeded  to  the  baronetcy  in  the  year  1863,  and 


MR.    ROWLAND    ERRINGTON  163 

was  in  his  turn  succeeded  in  the  title  by  his  brother, 
Mr.  John  Massey  Stanley,  who,  in  partnership  with  Sir 
Joseph  Hawley,  used  to  run  a  few  racehorses  in  Italy 
during  their  visit  to  Florence.  Sir  William,  the  next 
baronet,  however,  sold  the  Hooton  estate,  and  so  severed 
the  connection  of  centuries  of  the  house  of  Stanley  with 
the  county  of  Cheshire. 

It  was  at  the  expiration  of  the  season  1834-35  that 
Mr.  Errington  announced  his  willingness  to  hunt  the 
country,  and  no  sooner  was  his  intention  made  known 
than  he  was  invited  to  the  inevitable  dinner,  which  at 
that  time  was  given  to  each  master  who  undertook 
the  onus  of  government.  It  is  said  that  more  than  a 
hundred  farmers  were  present  at  the  function,  many  of 
them  being  considerable  freeholders,  as  well  as  large 
occupiers  of  land.  Mr.  Burgess  of  Clipstone,  Notting- 
hamshire, who  hunted  his  own  harriers  when  he  was 
not  out  with  the  Ouorn,  presided  at  the  feast,  and  in 
very  excellent  fashion  did  he  appear  to  discharge  his 
duties,  for  a  few  days  afterwards,  on  some  one  asking 
how  the  affair  had  passed  off,  the  reply  was,  'Capitally. 
Such  a  chairman  !  Made  nearly  all  the  speeches  ;  gave 
all  the  cheers  ;  drank  four  bottles  of  wine,  and  walked 
away  sober."  What  higher  praise  could  be  awarded  to 
a  chairman  of  the  old  school  ? 

In  connection  with  Mr.  Errington's  mastership  of 
the  Quorn,  it  should  be  mentioned  that  that  gentleman 
was  the  means  of  bringing  out  the  afterwards  famous 
huntsman  Charles  Payne,  whose  first  acquaintance  with 
hounds  was  riding  Mr.  Errington's  second  horse  ;  but 
he  entered  that  gentleman's  service  before  he  took  the 
mastership.  Through  the  good  offices  of  George  Beers 
he  was  made  whip  to  the  Oakley,  where  he  stayed  for 
ten  years,  after  which  he  went  as  first  whipper-in  and 
kennel  huntsman  to  the  Pytchlcy,  over  which  his 
namesake   Mr.  George    Payne  of  Sulby  presided.      On 


164  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

Lord  Althorpe  succeeding  Mr.  Payne,  Charles  Payne 
was  promoted  to  the  huntsman's  place,  and  began  that 
brilliant  career  which  never  ceased  until  he  resigned  the 
post  of  huntsman  to  Sir  Watkin  Wynri  in  1883.  He 
left  the  Pytchley  and  went  to  Wynnstay  in  1865,  when 
"merry"  John  Walker  retired  from  Sir  Watkin's  service. 

In  Mr.  Errington's  time  they  must  have  begun  cub- 
hunting  pretty  early,  as  we  find  it  chronicled  that  the 
hounds  were  not  out  cub-hunting  till  August  31.  During 
his  first  November  sport  was  almost  uniformly  bad,  but 
a  little  later  on — that  is  to  say,  about  the  middle  of 
December — the  hounds  met  at  Widmerpool,  when  a 
very  small  field  joined  them,  not  more  than  twenty,  it  is 
said.  After  a  somewhat  unsatisfactory  morning,  a  fox 
was  found  in  Ellar's  Gorse  ;  he  ran  towards  Wymes- 
wold,  and  after  a  check  went  as  hard  as  he  could  to 
Ragdale  House  and  Schoby  Scholes ;  passed  at  the 
bottom  of  Lord  Aylesford's  Gorse,  and  eventually  ran 
to  ground  in  the  Belvoir  country,  after  a  capital 
hunting  run  of  two  hours,  which  showed  that  the 
hounds  could  work  as  well  as  the  slowest  pack  in  the 
kingdom. 

Mr.  Errinpton  had  his  hounds  divided  into  three 
packs — the  dogs,  the  bitches,  and  the  mixed  pack  ;  but 
the  bitches  were  generally  the  favourites.  Although  the 
master  might  not  have  had  the  best  of  luck  at  the  open- 
ing of  his  first  season,  he  did  better  towards  its  close, 
some  very  excellent  runs  taking  place  in  March  and 
April.  On  one  day  in  March  they  met  at  Lowesby, 
found  at  John  o'  Gaunt's,  and  ran  on,  making  something- 
like  a  twelve-mile  point,  which  was  said  to  have  been 
done  in  little  more  than  one  hour  and  thirty-five  minutes  ; 
while  in  April  there  took  place  from  Botany  Bay  a  run 
that  knocked  up  almost  every  horse  out  ;  Mountford,  the 
huntsman,  was  unluckily  injured  by  falling  at  a  fence 
which  scarcely  anybody  cleared. 


MR.    ROWLAND    ERRINGTON  165 

Before  the  season  closed  hounds  had  a  slow  hunting 
run  from  Mr.  Cradock's  Gorse,  but  except  that  they 
had  a  good  forty  minutes,  the  run  was  only  remarkable 
for  the  fact  that  although  the  fox  had  half-an-hour's 
start  of  the  hounds,  Sir  David  Baird,  one  of  the  char- 
acters of  the  Hunt,  jumped  the  Melton  Brook,  "by  way 
of  amusement,"  for  there  was  a  bridge  less  than  a  hun- 
dred yards  off,  and  the  hounds  had  checked.  Lord 
Waterford  and  Mr.  A,  Paget  got  in,  and  the  former, 
who  was  nothing  if  not  thoroughgoing,  had  a  second 
shot  at  the  brook  with  the  same  result ;  and  he  was 
in  the  water  so  long  that  people  thought  he  would  surely 
be  drowned,  for  his  horse  had  his  feet  on  his  chest. 
When  he  did  reach  the  surface  it  was  found  that  he  had 
lost  his  hat  and  both  his  stirrups,  and  when  at  last  his 
horse  was  recovered,  his  lordship  trotted  in  a  rather  sad 
state  of  mind  back  to  Melton. 

It  was  about  this  time  (1836)  that  the  Duke  of  Wel- 
lington paid  a  visit  to  Leicestershire,  and  is  said  to  have 
given  it  the  flattering  appellation  of  the  "  nursery  of 
valour,"  a  phrase  which  would  seem  to  be  merely  a 
replica  of  the  statement  that  the  battle  of  Waterloo  was 
won  in  the  Eton  playing-fields,  a  saying  which  has 
often  been  contradicted. 

In  Mr.  Errington's  time  as  now,  Leicestershire  was 
nothing  if  not  sociable,  and  although  previous  masters 
may  have  done  their  best  towards  hunting  the  country, 
there  was  one  matter  which  they  all  appeared  to  have 
neglected,  and  that  was  the  Hunt  ball.  We  learn  that 
for  years  it  had  been  a  subject  of  complaint  and  dissatis- 
faction in  the  county  that  no  such  function  had  been 
established  annually ;  and  Mr.  Errington  no  sooner 
learned  that  there  existed  a  feeling  of  discontent  on  this 
point  than,  with  his  usual  promptitude  and  liberality, 
he  began  to  devise  means  for  organising  a  satisfactory 
dance.       He  saw  that  if  the  thing  was  to  be  done  at 


166  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

all  it  should  be  done  well;  so  in  the  year  1836,  being 
assisted  by  a  band  of  willing  workers,  a  ball  was  brought 
off  at  the  Assembly  Rooms,  Leicester.  The  arrange- 
ments were  excellent ;  the  supper  is  said  to  have  been 
splendid,  and  Weippert's  full  band  was  in  attendance. 
So  even  in  those  days  hunting  men  did  not  get  all  they 
wanted  round  about  the  neighbourhood.  Lord  Wilton, 
Messrs.  E.  B.  Hartopp  and  E.  B.  Farnham  lent  valu- 
able assistance  to  the  master  of  the  Quorn  ;  and  Lord 
Wilton,  in  proposing  Mr.  Errington's  health  after  supper, 
spoke  of  him  as  "a  friend,  a  gentleman,  and  a  public 
character." 

The  season  of  1836-37  was  an  improvement  on  that 
which  had  preceded.  Since  Lord  Southampton  had 
bought  the  Oakley  hounds,  neither  the  pack  nor  the  staff 
had  undergone  any  alteration.  George  Mountford  was 
still  huntsman,  Will  Derry  was  first  whipper-in,  and 
George  Beers  second.  The  last-named  left  in  1836  to 
become  huntsman  to  Mr.  Musters  in  Nottinghamshire  ; 
and  he  was  replaced  by  Tom  Ball,  who  had  formerly 
whipped  in  under  Mr.  Grantley  Berkeley,  and  with 
Mr.  Wilkins  in  Northamptonshire  when  that  gentle- 
man hunted  the  Pytchley  country. 

The  season  of  1837-38  was  somewhat  brilliant,  good 
runs,  both  in  cub-hunting  and  during  the  season  of 
regular  hunting,  coming  thick  and  fast ;  while  there  was 
an  abundant  supply  of  foxes,  an  improvement  on  matters 
in  the  previous  years.  Mr.  Errington  by  this  time  had 
announced  his  intention  of  living  at  Melton,  and  it  was 
during  this  season,  probably  early  in  1838,  that  Mr. 
(afterwards  Sir)  Francis  Grant  was  deputed  by  him  to 
paint  the  picture  of  the  "Melton  Hunt  Breakfast." 
Hunting  pictures  in  the  open  air  had  been  plentiful 
enough  ;  as  one  critic  said,  "  there  were  few  mansions 
whose  walls  were  not  adorned  by  'hunting  pieces,' in 
which    sundry   elderly    gentlemen    in   grotesque-looking 


MR.    ROWLAND    ERRINGTON  167 

habiliments,  jack-boots  and  ruffles,  are  seen  quietly 
ambling  up  the  hillside,  preceded  or  followed  by  several 
hounds."  It  was  not,  perhaps,  until  the  present  century 
dawned  that  hunting  pictures  attracted  the  serious  notice 
of  painters,  and  perhaps  the  connecting-link  between  the 
old  and  newer  schools  was  the  painting  of  the  celebrated 
Billesdon  Coplow  run,  formerly  in  the  possession  of  Sir 
Thomas  Parkyns,  of  Bunny,  and  afterwards  in  that  of 
Mr.  Rowland  Errington,  of  Hooton.  It  was  said  to  have 
been  a  very  life-like  picture.  Mr.  Errington's  picture, 
though,  was  something  of  a  new  departure,  for  it  repre- 
sented no  incident  in  the  hunting  field  but  a  breakfast 
at  Melton,  and  on  the  canvas  were  depicted  eleven  of 
the  best  sportsmen  then  known  in  Leicestershire.  The 
artist  was  most  successful  in  grouping  his  figures.  The 
time  is  evidently  not  up  for  starting,  and  the  fixture  is 
at  Billesdon.  Mr.  Arthur  Stanley  (the  elder  brother 
of  Mr.  Errington),  Lord  Wilton,  Count  Matuscewitz, 
Lord  Gardner,  Mr.  Lyne  Stephens,  Sir  Frederick  John- 
stone, Lord  Rokeby,  Lord  Forester,  Lord  Kinnaird, 
and  Mr.  Rowland  Errington  are  the  characters  in  the 
picture,  while  the  waiter  is  he  of  the  George  Inn, 
Melton,  and  his  was  said  to  be  the  best  likeness  in 
the  painting. 

One  of  the  criticisms  passed  upon  the  painting  at  the 
time  was  that  there  was  not  a  single  Irishman  in  it,  and 
this  was  thought  to  be  an  oversight,  inasmuch  as  Mr. 
Errington  enjoyed  the  friendship  of  a  great  many  Irish- 
men. Nor,  was  it  remarked,  was  there  any  fox-hunter 
of  the  old  school,  such  men  as  Mr.  Moore,  Sir  James 
Musgrave,  and  Val  Maher  being  altogether  passed 
over. 

In  the  April  of  1 838,  shortly  before  Mr.  Errington  gave 
up  the  hounds,  there  was  given  at  Drury  Lane  an  extrava- 
ganza called  "The  Meltonians,"  a  production  which  the 
playbills  termed   "an  original,  good-humoured,  and  per- 


168  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

fectly  illegitimate  drama."      It  was  written  by  Mr.  Peake, 
and  had  long  been  in  rehearsal,  but  owing  to  an  accident 
to   Mr.  Anderson,  one  of  the  chief  performers,  and  the 
superior  attraction  of  Mr.  Charles  Kean,  it  was  reserved 
for  Easter,  for  at  that  time  a  novelty  of  some  sort  was  pro- 
duced at  Easter  as  regularly  as  was  a  pantomime  at  Christ- 
mas.    It  was  said  to  illustrate  the  doings  of  a  certain  young 
nobleman,  in  whom  the  reader  will  recognise  the  high- 
spirited  Lord  Waterford,  whose  frolics  and  eccentricities 
gained  so  much  notoriety,  not   only  in  Melton  Mowbray 
but   elsewhere.       Most   people    had     seen    pictures    of 
Melton,    in    which    Lord    Waterford    was    represented 
painting  the  toll-bar  house  a  scarlet  as  bright  as  that  of 
his  own  coat,  while  his  collection  of  door-knockers  from 
Melton  and  other  places  was  said  to  be  the  largest  in 
the  world.     The  characters  in  the  play  chiefly  consisted 
of  about  a   dozen   Meltonians,  and   it   is  said  that  their 
persons    and    characters    and  habits  were  brought  into 
strong  and  striking  contrast  with  those   of  a  couple  of 
Frenchmen  and  the  family  of  a  retired  merchant-tailor. 
The  success,  however,  of  the  piece  depended  upon  some 
tableaux  which  were  given,  and  which  represented  the 
exploits  of  Lord  Waterford.      The  subjects  there  repre- 
sented were  three  :  first,  "  Larking  at  the  Toll-gate  ;  or, 
Comino-  in  for  the  Brush  ; "  second,   "  Taking  a  Five- 
barred  Gate  in  the  Drawing-room ;  "  third,  "  Quick  Work 
without  a  Contract  by  Tip-top  Sawyers."     The  second 
was  said  to  be  the  best.     The  five-barred  gate  was  put 
up  in  the  stage  drawing-room,  and  a  horse,  having  more 
the  appearance  of  a  hunter  than  anything  generally  seen 
upon  the  stage,  was  brought  in  and  made  to  take  the 
leap  very  cleverly.     This  reminds  one  of  a  play  pro- 
duced   in     London,     representing    some     incidents     in 
Shropshire,  when  the  Salopians  went  up  to   London  to 
show  the  theatrical  people  how  a  view  halloa  should  be 
given  ;  while  it  is  also  rather  suggestive  of  "  Formosa,"  a 


MR.    ROWLAND    ERRINGTON  169 

play  produced  by  Mr.  Boucicault  many  years  ago,  and 
which  was  supposed  to  represent  incidents  in  the  training 
of  an  Oxford  crew  during  their  stay  in  town. 

In  reference  to  the  closing  days  of  Mr.  Errington's 
mastership,  there  appeared  in  one  of  the  local  papers  an 
extract  from  Blackwood's  Magazine  from  Mr.  Gardiner's 
"  Music  and  Friends."  The  author,  Mr.  William  Gar- 
diner, was  one  of  the  house  of  Gardiner  &  Sons,  hosiers 
and  stocking-makers,  and  he  wrote  as  follows  : — 

Our  time  passed  pleasantly  enough,  and  from  the  description 
my  friend  gave  of  the  delights  of  the  chase  in  Leicestershire, 
they  determined  to  pay  a  visit  to  our  green  fields  during  the 
following  season.  In  November  the  champions  arrived  with 
horses,  grooms,  and  lackeys.  Finding  that  I  was  no  hunter  they 
expressed  great  surprise  at  my  want  of  taste,  and  insisted  upon 
mounting  me  upon  one  of  their  steeds,  and  that  I  should  see  for 
the  first  time  in  my  life  something  of  the  sports  of  the  field.  I 
so  far  consented  as  to  accompany  them  to  covert,  to  witness  the 
sight  of  throwing  off;  but  I  was  cautious  not  to  join  in  the  chase. 
I  was  mounted  on  a  delightful  creature,  who,  with  an  elevated 
crest,  was  gazing  round  the  country,  like  a  giraffe,  as  we  gently 
rode  to  Carlton  Clump.  On  arriving  there,  the  high-mettled 
steeds  were  walked  about  by  spruce  and  cunning  grooms  waiting 
their  masters'  arrival.  Soon  as  mounted,  the  phalanx  of  scarlet 
began  to  canter  from  covert  to  covert,  surmounting  the  hedgerows 
by  easy  leaps.  This  mightily  pleased  me.  The  cry  of  the  dogs 
and  the  agreeable  motion  made  me  forget  the  company  I  was  in ; 
and  just  as  I  was  about  to  return,  up  started  a  fox,  when  my 
resolution  availed  me  nothing,  for  my  horse,  which  had  playfully 
scampered  over  the  green  turf  just  before,  shot  like  an  arrow  from 
a  bow  and  headlong  we  went — 

O'er  hill  and  dale, 
O'er  park  and  pale, 

till  we  came  to  Hallaton  Wood.  Here  sly  reynard  concealed 
himself,  and  we  were  at  fault.  During  the  interval  every  eye 
was  upon  the  covert.  I  was  asked  by  Sir  Thomas  Clarges,  on 
which  side  the  wood  I  thought  the  fox  would  break  ?  I  replied, 
"  My  dear  sir,  it  is  the  first  day  I  ever  saw  a  pack  of  hounds." 


170  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

Upon  which  the  celebrated  Mr.  Mellish  exclaimed,  "Where  the 
h — 11,  sir,  were  you  born  ?  "  However,  just  as  my  reason  had 
returned  and  I  was  about  to  quit  the  field,  up  sprang  another 
fox  and  we  were  off  again  like  the  wind.  Near  Uppingham  we 
hurried  down  a  declivity  at  full  gallop,  which  I  have  since  con- 
sidered the  maddest  action  of  my  life.  Helter-skelter  we  then 
rushed  forward  to  Launde,  where  reynard  met  his  death.  The 
impetuous  creature  upon  which  I  was,  mad  with  heat  and  sport, 
by  way  of  a  finish,  plunged  over  head  and  ears  with  me  into  a 
gravel  pit  filled  with  water.  We  swam  out  on  the  other  side, 
and  by  the  time  I  had  ridden  the  eighteen  miles  back  to  Leicester 
my  ardour  for  fox-hunting  was  completely  cooled. 


It  is  perhaps  as  well  to  read  accounts  of  hunting 
from  all  points  of  view,  and  in  connection  with  another 
dictum  of  hunting,  it  may  be  said  that  it  was  Valentine 
Maher,  a  famous  fox-hunter,  who  for  twenty-five  years 
passed  his  winters  at  Melton,  who  said  that  it  was 
better  fun  to  ride  to  and  from  covert  in  Leicestershire 
than  to  hunt  in  any  other  part  of  the  kingdom.  This 
saying,  by  the  way,  has  been  attributed  to  Whyte-Mel- 
ville,  but  inasmuch  as  it  appeared  in  print  in  1859,  it  is 
tolerably  obvious  that  it  became  a  saying  before  Whyte- 
Melville  was  given  to  the  utterance  of  epigrams. 

The  season  of  1837-38  was  Mr.  Errington's  last, 
and  a  farewell  dinner  was  given  to  him  at  Leicester. 
About  a  hundred  and  twenty  hunting  men  were  present 
most  of  those  at  the  chief  table  being  in  scarlet.  Mr. 
E.  C.  Hartopp  took  the  chair,  and  the  company  included 
the  Duke  of  Beaufort,  the  Marquis  of  Hastings,  the 
Earls  of  Wilton  and  Chesterfield,  Count  Batthyany, 
Lords  Rancliffe,  Gardner,  Clanwilliam,  Macdonald, 
Eglinton,  Castlereagh,  Joscelyn,  Dunmore,  and  others. 
It  seems  to  have  been  hoped  that,  when  Mr.  Errington 
determined  to  give  up  the  country,  the  Duke  of  Beaufort 
would  have  taken  it ;  but  as  he  hunted  his  own  pack, 
which  had  been  in  that  family  for  a  good  many  years,  it 


MR.    ROWLAND    ERRINGTON 


171 


was  hardly  likely  that  he  would  abandon  it  to  take  a 
strange  country.  Mr.  Errington  could  not  be  induced 
to  reconsider  his  decision,  and  eventually  Lord  Chester- 
field bought  the  Ouorn  hounds,  wherewith  to  hunt  the 
Pytchley  country,  which  he  had  just  taken. 


CHAPTER    VI 

LORD    SUFFIELD    (1838-1839) 

MR.    THOMAS    HODGSON    (1839-1841) 


'73 


CHAPTER  VI 

LORD     SUFFIELD 

1838   1839 

LORD  SUFFIELD,  as  soon  as  it  was  understood 
/  that  he  would  succeed  Mr.  Errington  in  the  master- 
ship of  the  Ouorn  hounds,  was  described  as  "  a  noble- 
man unknown  as  a  fox-hunter."  This  description  is 
perhaps  scarcely  accurate  ;  for,  although  he  was  but  five- 
and-twenty  years  of  age  (having  been  born  in  181 3)  when 
he  entered  upon  the  Quorn  country,  he  had  hunted  with 
Mr.  Errington,  and  had  proved  himself  a  bold  horseman. 
Edward  Vernon  Harbord  succeeded  to  the  title  in  1835, 
on  the  death  of  his  father,  who  was  killed  in  London  by 
a  fall  from  his  hack,  and  the  son  came  into  an  income 
of  ,£14,000  a  year.  After  leaving  school  he  went  up  to 
Christ  Church,  Oxford,  where  he  remained  for  a  short 
time  only,  and  then,  like  his  predecessors  Lord  Foley 
and  Mr.  Osbaldeston,  took  to  racing,  which  eventually 
ruined  him,  as  it  had  been  the  cause  of  their  downfall. 
A  contemporary  wrote  of  him  : — 

His  lordship  since  his  debut  on  the  turf  has  been  fortunate 
in  purchasing  some  good  horses,  among  which  we  may  mention 
Newlight,  not  particularly  splendid ;  Alfred,  that  is  to  be  great ; 
and  Caravan,  which  could  not  go  quite  fast  enough  for  the  Derby. 
Had  Caravan  won  this  race  (1837)  his  lordship  would  have 
pocketed  an  immense  sum. 

Passing  mention  must  be  made  of  the  Derby  of  1837, 

because  it  bore  directly  upon  Lord  Sufheld's  lamentable 

failure  as  M.F.H.     In  Caravan  he  thought  that  he  had  a 

175 


176  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

smart  horse,  and  backed  him  for  pounds,  shillings,  and 
pence.  Lord  Berners  x  had  a  horse  named  Phosphorus, 
but  he  suffered  so  much  from  a  disease  in  the  feet  that  no 
one  deemed  his  chance  worth  thinking  about :  he  had  not 
had  a  gallop  for  ten  days,  and  on  the  eve  of  the  race  his 
trainer  went  to  Lord  Berners,  and  pointing  out  the 
horse's  condition,  asked  what  was  to  be  done  on  the 
morrow  ;  was  the  horse  to  run  ?  Lord  Berners,  a  quaint, 
strong-minded  old  man — he  was  seventy-seven  years 
of  age  at  the  time — was  not  given  to  long  speeches, 
so  he  merely  said,  "Run?  I  always  run,"  adding  that 
Phosphorus  would  have  to  go  if  he  broke  down  in  half- 
a-dozen  strides  from  the  start.  There  were  a  couple  of 
breaks  away  before  the  flag  fell,  and  after  a  punishing 
finish,  Phosphorus  beat  Caravan  by  half  a  length,  and 
the  defeat  of  the  latter  cost  Lord  Suffield  a  pretty  penny. 
It  was  not  long  after  this  crushing  loss  that  Lord 
Suffield,  undismayed  by  his  liabilities,  decided  to  offer 
himself  as  Mr.  Errington's  successor  ;  but  perhaps  he 
would  not  have  been  quite  so  readily  accepted  by  the 
country,  had  there  not  been  some  idea  that  Lord  Gardner, 
his  brother-in-law,  and  a  magnificent  horseman,2  was  to  be 
a  sort  of  sleeping  partner  in  the  concern  ;  this  idea,  how- 
ever, turned  out  to  be  quite  erroneous,  as  Lord  Gardner, 
though  a  constant  follower  of  the  hounds,  at  no  time 
had  any  share  in  the  management,  though  Mr.  Bernal 
Osborne,  the  author  of  the  "  Chaunt  of  Achilles,"  per- 
haps entertained  a  different  idea,  judging  at  least  from  the 
following  extract  from  the  above-named  publication  : — 

But  lo  !  where  following  on  his  chestnut  dark, 
The  grinning  Gardner  gallops  down  the  Park ; 
Slow  in  the  senate,  tho'  not  wanting  sense, 
Quick  in  retort,  but  quicker  at  a  fence ; 


1  Lord  Berners  was  much  interested  in  the  breeding  of  Hereford  cattle 

2  It  was  said  that  Lord  Suffield  would  have  shown  to  greater  advantage 
over  a  country  had  he  not  been  eclipsed  by  his  brother-in-law. 


LORD    SUFFIELD  177 

With  him  no  hunter  ever  dare  refuse  ; 

His  hand  so  perfect,  damnable  his  muse  ! x 

Strange,  tho'  for  years  I've  listened  to  the  crowd 

Who  canvass  character,  the  rich,  and  proud, 

Of  him  alone,  as  yet  I  never  heard 

One  kindly  action  or  approving  word  ; 

Sparing  of  cash,  he  ne'er  outruns  his  bounds, 

And  Suffield  keeps,  whilst  Gardner  hunts  the  hounds. 

At  the  time  of  his  taking  the  country,  Lord  Suffield 
had  neither  hounds  nor  huntsman.  Mr.  Ralph  Lambton, 
who  in  his  early  days  had  hunted  in  Leicestershire 
before  succeeding  his  brother  in  the  mastership  of  the 
family  pack,  gave  up  his  hounds  just  as  Lord  Suffield 
was  in  want  of  a  pack,  and  then  after  some  little  diffi- 
culty the  new  master  bought  them  for  the  consider- 
able sum  of  3000  guineas.  Sir  Matthew  White  Ridley, 
master  of  the  Blagdon  Hunt  in  Northumberland,  wanted 
the  Lambton  hounds  for  his  country,  but  he  gave  way, 
and  they  became  the  property  of  Lord  Suffield. 

It  is  worthy  of  note  that  not  long  before  they  left 
Durham  "  Nimrod  "  paid  them  a  visit,  and  wrote  of 
them  in  highly  eulogistic  terms,  making  especial  mention 
of  the  fact  that  they  were  extremely  steady  from  riot. 

Another  circumstance  occurred  which  created  a  smile.  Whilst 
picking  out  a  cold  scent  in  the  middle  of  a  rough  grass-field,  all 
the  pack  being  at  work,  a  brace  of  hares  jumped  up  in  view;  not 
a  hound  noticed  them,  on  which  I  heard  Mr.  Lambton  say :  "  I 
hope  the  Professor  ('  Nimrod  ')  saw  that."  I  did  see  it,  and  I 
agree  with  Lord  Kintore  that  any  wild  animal  jumping  up  in  view 
of  hounds  in  a  moment  of  disappointment  and  baffle,  such  as  this 
was,  puts  their  steadiness  from  riot  to  the  test,  and  if  unnoticed 
confirms  it. 

Lord  Suffield,  together  with  his  brother-in-law  Lord 
Gardner,  took  Lowesby  Hall,  which  had  previously  been 
occupied  by  the  Marquis  of  Waterford  and  Lord  Glen- 
dyne,  and  celebrated  as  the  scene  of  the  Marquis's  res 

1    Vide  his  rhymes  in  the  "  Book  of  Beauty." 

M 


178  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

gestce,  such  as  riding  up  and  down  the  marble  staircase, 
and  leaping  Cock  Robin  over  chairs  and  tables  in  the 
drawing-room.1 

When,  however,  the  hounds  arrived  in  Leicestershire 
they  were  "  crabbed  "  by  nearly  every  one,  though  Tread- 
well,  the  huntsman  who  brought  them  from  the  Sedgfield 
country  into  Leicestershire,  declared  that  they  wanted  no 
hunting.  In  spite  of  a  crippled  purse,  Lord  Suffield 
began  his  career  regardless  of  expense.  His  stables 
were  filled  with  the  best  horses  to  be  procured  for  money 
— or  credit ;  he  built  new  kennels  at  Billesdon,  at  a  cost 
of  ^4500 ;  he  approached  the  farmers  and  landowners 
in  a  very  conciliatory  spirit,  and  to  those  who  were 
unaware  of  his  pecuniary  embarrassments  his  term  of 
mastership  promised  to  be  successful  enough. 

Lord  Suffield  expressed  himself  as  determined  to 
show  sport,2  and,  resolving  that  the  farmers  should  be 
gainers  rather  than  losers  by  the  presence  of  the  Ouorn 
Hunt,  declared  that  he  would  pay  all  damage  and  spoil, 
and  would  buy  his  forage,  &c,  direct  from  the  farmers 
instead  of  from  the  dealers.  How  far  he  was  enabled 
to  carry  out  his  good  intentions  the  following  anecdote 
will  show  : — 

Upon  one  occasion  his  lordship  complained  to  his  stud-groom 
of  the  want  of  condition  in  his  horses. 

"  I  can't  help  it,"  was  the  brief  and  somewhat  surly  reply. 

"  Can't  help  it  ?  "  repeated  his  lordship,  surprise  portrayed  in 
every  feature ;  "  and  why  not  ?  " 


1  During  one  of  the  meetings  of  the  Royal  Hunt  Club  at  Aylesbury,  the 
Marquis  of  Waterford  had  his  horse  brought  upstairs  to  the  dining-room  at 
the  White  Hart  ;  and  a  grey  of  Charlie  Symonds's  is  said  there  to  have 
jumped  the  dinner-table  ;  he  was  ridden  over  it  by  Mr.  Manning,  a  sporting 
farmer.     See  "  Echoes  of  Old  Country  Life,"  by  J.  K.  Fowler. 

2  When  Lord  Suffield  first  took  the  country,  it  was  thought  that  he 
showed  a  tendency  to  baulking  the  people  who  came  out  on  foot,  so  a 
foremost  member  of  the  Hunt  begged  him  to  do  nothing  of  the  kind,  as 
if  he  did  the  disappointed  pedestrians  would  be  sure  to  kill  foxes  by  way  of 
retaliation. 


LORD    SUFFIELD  179 

"  Because  I  ain't  got  no  corn,"  added  the  stud-groom. 

"  Immediately  apply  to  the  steward,  then,"  said  his  master 
angrily. 

"  I  did,  my  lord,  this  morning,"  replied  the  man ;  "  but  he  told 
me  it  was  no  use  coming  to  him,  as  the  corn-dealer  would  stand 
tick  no  longer." 

"That's  an  unpleasant  circumstance,"  said  his  lordship  reflec- 
tively. 

"  Yes,  and  so  I  said  at  the  time,  my  lord,"  returned  the  ser- 
vant; "but  he  said  he  couldn't  help  it — that  none  of  the  trades- 
people would  give  any  more  credit,  except  the  pastry-cook." 

"  D it !  if  that's  the  case,  feed  your  horses  on  jelly"  replied 

his  master,  after  a  pause  for  the  hatching  of  a  remedy.1 

Lord  Suffield's  fixture  on  the  5th  November  1838  2 
was  not  productive  of  much  sport,  and  is  only  mentioned 
on  account  of  the  following  incident : — 

The  first  thing  that  they  noticed  was  that  the  beautiful  and 
well-known  ash-tree,  long  standing  in  majestic  solitude  on  an 
artificial  tumulus — for  half  a  century  the  trysting-place  of  the 
Hunt — had  been  victimised  by  the  late  storm.  There  it  lay,  once 
the  admiration  of  all  beholders — the  pride  of  the  park — the  tree 
which  Meynell  had  climbed  to  see  the  finale  of  a  run,  when  his 
steed  could  travel  no  farther. 

Before  leaving  the  year  1838,  it  may  be  as  well  to 
make  reference  to  a  letter  written  by  "A  Leicestershire 
Farmer  and  Fox-hunter  "  to  the  Leicester  Journal,  if  only 
to  show  how  history  repeats  itself.  The  writer  of  the  letter 
suggested  that,  instead  of  the  members  of  the  Quorn 
Hunt  giving  ^60,  as  usual,  to  be  run  for  at  Leicester, 
it  would  be  better  to  give  it  in  one,  two,  or  three  prizes 
for  the  best  young  horses  calculated  to  make  hunters  ; 
to  be  bond  fide  the  property  of  farmers  in  the  Ouorn 
country.      The  reasons  given  were  that  many  non-hunt- 

1  The  anecdote  is  in  a  book  called  "  The  Sporting  Life  of  England,"  by 
John  Mills,  author  of  "  The  Flyers  of  the  Hunt,"  "  Life  of  a  Foxhound,"  &c. 

2  In  the  year  1838  died  Mr.  John  Cradock,  who  succeeded  his  father  as 
secretary  to  the  Hunt.    More  will  be  said  about  the  Cradock  family  later  on, 


180  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

ing  farmers  have  their  land  crossed  and  breed  horses  ; 
those  who  did  hunt  liked  to  have  a  horse  to  carry  them 
well,  but  did  not  care  to  encounter  the  trouble  and  ex- 
pense of  putting  the  horse  into  training  ;  and  that  the 
stakes  were,  more  often  than  not,  won  not  by  a  hunter 
but  by  some  thoroughbred  screw  worth  not  more  than 
^25,  and  which  could  not  get  over  a  country  at  all. 
The  writer  further  suggested  that  if  the  premiums  he 
suggested  were  given,  the  non-hunting  as  well  as  the 
hunting  farmer  would  stand  the  chance  of  being  benefited. 
It  is  curious  to  find  that  the  lines  proposed  sixty  years  ago 
by  a  farmer  have  been  adopted  by  the  Royal  Agricultural 
and  Hunters'  Improvement  Societies,  as  well  as  by  most 
agricultural  societies  and  promoters  of  horse  shows. 

We  learn  very  little  about  the  sport  of  Lord  Suffield's 
hounds  during  November  and  December  1838.  His 
hounds  were  said  to  be  slack  drawers  and  as  slow  as  a 
man  in  boots,  until  one  fine  day  when  there  chanced  to 
be  something  like  a  scent. 

A  fox  was  found  in  Shearsby  Gorse ;  the  hounds  went  away 
on  good  terms  with  him  ;  left  the  hard-riding  field  behind  at  every 
stride ;  and,  after  having  the  fun  all  to  themselves  for  three- 
quarters  of  an  hour  over  the  Gumley  country,  rolled  over  their 
fox  and  ate  him  up,  "brush  and  all,"  without  a  man  being  within 
two  fields  of  them.  At  Gumley  the  leading  men  were  in  absolute 
ignorance  of  their  whereabouts,  and  had  it  not  been  for  Mr. 
Tilbury  (the  well-known  dealer  in  hunters),  whose  quick  eye  espied 
a  couple  of  labourers  running  in  the  distance  to  the  left,  it  is  pos- 
sible that  no  one  might  have  seen  them  again.  Tilbury,  however, 
making  an  excuse  that  he  had  lost  a  shoe,  pulled  up  for  a  moment, 
and  when  the  rest  of  the  field  had  ridden  aimlessly  on  for  some 
distance,  the  astute  old  dealer  turned  away  and  galloped  as  hard 
as  he  could  to  the  left,  where  he  had  seen  the  labourers  running, 
followed  by  one  person  only,  to  whom  he  had  given  a  hint  of  what 
was  going  to  happen,  and  none  but  these  two  could  give  any 
account  of  what  had  taken  place  during  the  last  ten  minutes. 
"  Hounds  ran  mute  from  start  to  finish,  and  old  Tilbury  made  the 
most  of  what  little  he  did  see." 


LORD    SUFFIELD  181 

Towards  the  close  of  Lord  Suffield's  first  and  only 
season  (1838-39),  that  is  to  say,  in  the  month  of  March 
1839,  the  hounds  met  at  Kirby  Gate  and  made  ample 
atonement  for  any  previous  shortcomings,  if  they  ever 
existed,  by  bringing  off  one  of  the  best  runs  Leicester- 
shire had  ever  seen. 

Cream  Gorse  was  the  starting-point,  and  away  went  the  fox 
towards  Melton,  afterwards  bearing  to  the  right  to  Great  Dalby 
and  pointing  for  Gartree,  hounds  running  at  a  tremendous  pace, 
again  without  any  one  with  them.  After  the  fox  had  run  through 
the  end  of  the  covert  and  up  the  hill  to  Little  Dalby,  he  went 
away  over  Burrough  Hill  to  within  a  few  fields  of  Somerby,  and 
thence  he  ran  almost  straight  to  John  o'  Gaunt's,  into  which 
covert  the  fox  ran  in  view  of  the  racing  pack;  but,  as  may  be 
supposed,  the  hounds  were  not  in  view  of  more  than  a  very  few 
of  the  large  field  of  the  morning.  After  dwelling  a  short  time  in 
covert,  this  good  fox  went  away  on  the  Tilton  side  for  Lowesby 
Hall,  which  he  succeeded  in  reaching  just  in  time  to  find  safety 
in  a  drain.  Lords  Gardner,  Waterford,  and  Wilton,  Mr.  Stuart 
Wortley,  Mr.  Little  Gilmour,  and  Sir  James  Musgrave,  though 
some  way  from  hounds,  were  the  nearest  to  them,  while  Tread- 
well,  the  huntsman,  was  in  a  good  position  all  through. 

The  run  was  estimated  at  about  fourteen  miles,  and 
the  time  a  little  over  an  hour  ;  but  either  time  or  dis- 
tance, or  both,  must  certainly  be  wrong.  Luck  favoured 
the  Quorn  during  the  week  in  which  the  above  run  took 
place,  as  two  other  capital  gallops  were  enjoyed,  and  then 
people  began  to  think  that  there  was  something  in  the 
Lambton  hounds  after  all. 

As  the  season  was  rapidly  drawing  to  a  close,  Lord 
Suffield  announced  his  intention  of  resigning  the  Quorn 
country  at  once,  a  statement  which  was  regretted  by  a 
good  many  and  caused  surprise  to  some,  while  others 
wondered  how  it  was  that  a  man  who  was  in  such  pecu- 
niary difficulties  as  was  Lord  Suffield  could  ever  have 
dreamed  of  becoming  master  of  so  expensive  a  hunt. 

Mrs.    Musters,    in  her   most   interesting   little   work, 


i82  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

entitled  "  Hunting  Songs  and  Sport,"  says  that  the 
hounds  and  horses  were  seized  by  the  bailiffs  while  on 
the  way  to  meet  at  Lodge  on  the  Wolds  ;  but  the  writer 
has  been  unable  to  verify  this  statement  or  to  find  it  said 
elsewhere.  There  is  also  an  account  of  how  the  hounds 
were  sent  to  London  by  train  and  driven  from  the  station 
to  their  town  quarters  in  carts — two  couples  in  a  cart — a 
sight  which  caused  great  excitement  among  the  cockneys, 
as  well  it  might.  The  writer  has  not  been  able  to  verify 
this  either. 

It  has  always  been  said  that  Mr.  Robertson,  who 
hunted  a  country  in  Northumberland,  gave  a  thousand 
guineas  for  the  hounds  which  cost  Lord  Suffield  thrice 
that  sum  ;  but  in  the  Sporting  Magazine  for  May  1839 
it  is  stated  that  on  the  25th  April  Lord  Suffield's  hounds, 
carriages,  and  horses  were  sold  at  the  "Corner"  by 
Messrs.  Tattersall  and  realised  the  sum  of  ^5859,  4s. 
The  yard  was  crammed  on  that  occasion.  Some  of  the 
horses  brought  long  prices — Grantham,  285  guineas  ; 
Metternich,  275  guineas;  Cigar,  225  guineas;  Mount- 
eagle,  210  guineas;  Bryan  O'Lynn,  210  guineas.  Then 
comes  the  statement  that  "the  hounds  for  which  Lord 
Suffield  had  given  3000  guineas  were  sold  in  eight  lots, 
and  produced  491  guineas,"  a  very  different  story  from 
the  1000  guineas  Mr.  Robertson  was  reported  to  have 
given  for  them.  Nevertheless  it  appears  tolerably  cer- 
tain that  the  hounds  did  go  north,  though  at  what  price 
it  was  impossible  to  say.  No  surprise  need  be  felt,  how- 
ever, if  the  true  state  of  the  case  be  that  the  pack 
brought  only  a  comparatively  small  sum.  The  original 
amount  of  3000  guineas  was  at  the  time  thought  to  be 
somewhat  extravagant,  especially  as  there  was  quite  a 
full  complement  of  old  hounds  which  could  not  be 
expected  to  last  more  than  another  season  or  two  ;  and 
as  Lord  Suffield,  not  much  of  a  hound  man,  had  them 
for  a  single  season  only,  it  stands  pretty  well  to  reason 


LORD    SUFFIELD  183 

that  he  could  have  done  nothing  to  bring  about  any 
improvement.  Lord  Suffield  went  abroad  immediately 
after  his  resignation. 

Just  before  he  went  out  of  office,  however,  a  meeting 
of  the  owners  of  coverts  was  held  at  the  Three  Crowns, 
Leicester,  at  which  it  was  agreed  by  Lord  Wilton,  as 
representative  of  Melton,  that  Lord  Hastings  (master 
of  the  Donington  hounds)  should  draw  Prestwold.  It 
was  also  agreed  that  the  Quorn  coverts  should  be 
managed  by  a  county  committee,  who  should  pay  the 
rent  and  charges  for  damage,  an  arrangement  which  was 
calculated  to  save  the  next  master  about  ^2000  a  year. 
Those  who  lived  beyond  the  confines  of  Melton  hoped 
very  sincerely  that  the  resolution  would  be  carried,  as 
during  several  previous  masterships  the  idea  had  pre- 
vailed that  the  Melton  clique  had  had  too  much  to  say 
to  the  conduct  of  affairs,  and  that  the  country  had  not 
been  hunted  quite  fairly.  With  the  retirement  then  of 
Lord  Suffield,  the  thirteenth  master  of  the  Quorn, 
including  Mr.  Boothby,  there  came  to  an  end  a  reign 
which  can  only  be  regarded  as  more  or  less  of  a  failure. 


184  THE    QUORN    HUNT 


MR.    THOMAS    HODGSON 
1839-1841 

THE  retirement  of  Lord  Suffield  was  so  sudden,  and 
apparently  so  unexpected,  that  at  the  time  of  his 
withdrawal  no  provision  whatever  seems  to  have  been 
made  for  the  future  hunting  of  the  country.  The  names 
of  sundry  gentlemen  who  were  likely  to  come  forward 
were  mentioned,  but  nothing  was  done  ;  and  a  good 
many  of  the  farmers  who  were  not  excessively  predis- 
posed to  hunting  took  the  opportunity  of  destroying  a 
great  number  of  foxes,  the  coverts  on  the  Laughton 
Hills  and  some  on  Charnwood  Forest  being  amongst 
those  which  suffered.  After  a  long  interval,  however,  it 
was  announced  that  Mr.  Thomas  Hodgson,  who  had 
shown  good  sport  in  Yorkshire,  when  master  of  the 
Holderness,  would  come  south  and  take  the  Quorn 
country. 

That  the  Hunt  was  not  particularly  well  off  for  funds 
may  be  gathered  from  the  fact  that  the  Melton  com- 
mittee at  once,  on  Lord  Suffield's  retirement,  gave  Tom 
Ball,1  the   second  whipper-in,   notice   to   quit,   as  it  was 

1  Ball,  luckily  for  himself,  left  the  Quorn  with  Treadwell  and  the 
hounds,  when  the  latter  were  sold  to  Mr.  Robertson.  His  first  situation 
was  in  his  native  county  of  Bedfordshire,  under  Mr.  Grantley  Berkeley  ; 
then  he  came  to  the  Quorn  under  Lord  Suffield  ;  and  upon  the  hounds  being 
sold  he  went  for  one  season  to  the  North.  Then  he  took  service  with 
Baron  Rothschild  and  whipped  in  to  Bill  Roffey,  and  afterwards  for  two 
seasons  to  William  Berwick.  He  was  somewhat  of  a  failure  as  a  huntsman, 
and  it  was  in  the  duties  of  a  whipper-in  that  he  chiefly  excelled.  He  was  a 
consummate  horseman,  and  no  one  could  beat  him  over  the  Vale  of  Ayles- 
bury, while  no  horse  appeared  to  pull  with  him. 


MR.    THOMAS    HODGSON  185 

suggested  that  his  continued  engagement  would  involve 
the  payment  of  wages,  and  the  authorities  did  not  feel 
themselves  rich  enough  to  become  liable  for  so  serious  a 
responsibility. 

Mr.  Hodgson's  advent  was  hailed  with  acclamation, 
for  his  reputation  in  Holderness  had  been  very  great, 
and  no  sooner  was  it  known  that  he  had  consented  to 
hunt  the  Ouorn  country  than  the  Holderness  farmers  at 
once  announced  their  intention  of  presenting  him  with 
a  testimonial  ;  and  in  1840  he  had  to  journey  north  to 
Driffield,  where  a  dinner  was  given  to  him,  at  which 
many  members  of  the  Holderness  Hunt  attended,  and 
a  handsome  though  small  service  of  plate  was  presented 
to  Mr.  Hodgson,  the  gift  having  been  purchased  by 
funds  raised  by  the  farmers  alone.  He  took  his  Holder- 
ness hounds  to  Leicestershire,  where  in  due  course  they 
gave  a  good  deal  of  satisfaction. 

Between  his  establishment  and  Lord  Suffield's, 
however,  there  was  a  most  extraordinary  difference. 
In  Lord  Suffield's  time,  says  a  writer  of  the  period, 
there  was  lavish  waste  in  every  department,  infinitely 
more  attention  being  paid  to  a  smart  turn-out  than  to 
the  sport  which  ensued.  The  morning's  show  was  bril- 
liant, the  performances  afterwards  were  voted  wretched. 
In  Mr.  Hodgson's  establishment,  however,  everything 
was  said  to  be  business-like,  without  parade  or  nonsense, 
giving  promise,  which  appears  to  have  been  kept,  of 
famous  runs  equalling  those  of  the  olden  times. 

Webb  had  been  Mr.  Hodgson's  huntsman  in  Hol- 
derness for  at  least  part  of  the  time  that  the  latter 
hunted  the  country,  but  learned  a  good  deal  of  his 
business  under  Mr.  Conyers,  in  Essex,  with  whom  he 
remained  thirteen  years,  and  then  went  to  the  Pytchley 
under  Mr.  Payne.  He  was  accounted  a  good  man  in 
Yorkshire,  was  a  bold  horseman,  and  the  widest  and 
deepest  of  Holderness   dykes  had   no   terrors   for   him, 


186  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

while  he  was  also  an  excellent  man  in  the  kennel.  But 
Yorkshire  and  Leicestershire  differ  widely  in  their  re- 
quirements, and  when  Webb  came  into  the  shires, 
"  Nimrod,"  who  happened  to  be  down  there  at  the  time, 
voted  him  slow,  and  other  people  taking  up  the  cry, 
Mr.  Hodgson  drafted  him  and  took  on  Tom  Day  in 
his  stead. 

Mr.  Hodgson's  new  huntsman  (Day)  had  a  long  and  varied 
career  with  hounds.  He  is  said  to  have  begun  life  with  a  sporting 
farmer  who  kept  some  harriers  in  Notts  or  Lincolnshire ;  thence 
he  went  as  second  whipper-in  to  Mr.  Foljambe  and  Lord  Scar- 
borough, remaining  with  the  latter  master  three  years.  He  was 
born  in  1798,  and,  as  he  went  to  Lord  Scarborough  when  about 
eighteen  years  old,  he  would  have  left  him  about  the  year  18 19. 
It  is  then  said  that  he  went  as  wbipper-in  to  Mr.  Osbaldeston, 
who  was  at  that  time  at  Quorn,  and  after  a  short  stay  with  the 
Squire  he  was  engaged  to  Sir  George  Sitwell  as  huntsman,  and 
then  when  he  gave  up  his  pack  Tom  Day  went  to  whip  in  to 
Assheton  Smith  in  the  Tedworth  country,  where  he  remained  for 
about  three  seasons.  His  next  place  was  as  whipper-in  under 
old  Will  Boxall  with  the  Warwickshire,  and  on  Boxall's  retire- 
ment he  was  appointed  huntsman,  and  from  all  accounts  he 
hunted  the  Warwickshire  for  about  five  or  six  years.  At  the 
beginning  of  the  season  1 840-41,  we  find  Tom  Day  as  huntsman 
to  the  Quorn  under  Mr.  Hodgson,  he  being  at  that  time  forty-two 
years  of  age  and  "decidedly  turning  grey."  In  the  Quorn 
country  he  remained  for  no  fewer  than  eighteen  seasons,  acting 
as  huntsman  for  Mr.  Hodgson,  Mr.  Greene,  and  Sir  Richard 
Sutton ;  and  then  when  the  Quorn  country  was  divided  Mr. 
Tailby  took  him  on,  authorised  him  to  get  a  pack  of  hounds 
together,  which  he  did,  and  he  hunted  them  for  one  season,  at 
the  expiration  of  which  he  quietly  settled  down  in  the  village  of 
Quorn,  where  he  lived  till  he  died  at  the  beginning  of  1878. 

Nature,  it  would  seem,  had  built  Tom  Day  on  the  lines  of  a 
jockey ;  he  is  said  to  have  ridden  but  a  few  pounds  or  so  over  eight 
stone ;  he  was  a  fine  horseman  with  beautiful  hands,  thoroughly 
understood  his  business,  was  very  popular,  and  was,  as  one  of 
Mr.  Hodgson's  followers  said,  "  very  intelligent  and  the  best- 
mannered  person  we  have  had  here  for  some  time."  While  Tom 
Day  was  huntsman  to  the  Quorn  he  had  his  full  share  of  falls, 
but  escaped   all  injury ;    yet  his   death  was   hastened   by  a  fall 


MR.    THOMAS    HODGSON  187 

downstairs  owing  to  failing  eyesight,  and  it  is  a  curious  coinci- 
dence that  on  the  day  of  his  death  the  hounds  were  advertised  to 
meet  at  Ratcliffe-on-the-Wreake,  and  they  were  due  to  meet  at 
the  same  place  on  the  day  of  Sir  Richard  Sutton's  death. 


Webb,  however,  it  is  only  fair  to  say,  was  badly 
mounted  for  Leicestershire,  and  this  fact  his  master 
readily  admitted,  for  no  sooner  had  Webb  left  than 
Day  found  fault  with  the  horses,  and  nearly  all  were 
sold  to  be  replaced  by  others  more  suited  to  the  country. 
Webb,  however,  in  spite  of  his  bad  horses  crossed  the 
country  in  an  extraordinary  manner,  and  even  "Nimrod" 
admitted  that  in  his  knowledge  of  the  run  of  a  fox  he 
had  no  superior.  On  the  whole,  therefore,  Webb  seems 
to  have  been  a  little  badly  treated,  and  of  course  his 
premature  departure  from  the  Quorn  annihilated  his 
chance  of  a  testimonial. 

When  he  hunted  his  Yorkshire  pack,  Mr.  Hodgson 
was  said  to  ride,  but  when  he  came  to  Leicestershire  his 
critics  said  he  never  rode  a  yard,  the  reason  given  by 
one  writer  being  that 

He  was  in  love  all  the  time  he  was  master  of  the  Quorn,  and 
had  special  injunctions  from  his  lady  fair — if  he  was  not  under  a 
vow — never  to  jeopardise  those  precious  long  limbs  of  his  by  riding 
at  timber.  Yet  what  glorious  sport  did  he  show  us.  With  him 
hunting  was  indeed  a  science,  and  his  lagging  habit  was  often  of 
more  real  service  in  the  field  than  the  go-ahead  hard  riding  of 
masters  who  hunt  for  riding's  sake  and  nothing  else. 

Another  critic  said  that  Mr.  Hodgson  was  a  capital 
whipper-in,  and  was  of  far  more  use  in  keeping  the  field 
in  order  when  somewhat  near  the  rear  rank,  than  he 
would  have  been  in  the  front.  But  this,  I  fancy,  may  be 
something  of  a  libel,  for  there  seems  every  reason  to 
believe  that,  although  Mr.  Hodgson  had  not  the  dash 
of  Osbaldeston  or   Assheton   Smith,   he  yet   rode  very 


188  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

fairly  over  a  country.  It  is  of  course  well  known  that  he 
rode  in  a  brown  coat,  and  a  pair  of  tanned  leather  knee- 
caps. The  reason  he  is  said  to  have  given  for  the  colour 
of  his  coat  is,  that  as  he  had  hunted  his  hounds  before  in 
Yorkshire,  he  should  not  like  them  to  see  him  in  scarlet 
when  he  was  not  hunting-  them.  This,  however,  is 
probably  only  a  fable,  because  Webb  certainly  hunted 
his  hounds  for  him  in  Holderness. 

During  Mr.  Hodgson's  second  season,  when  of  course 
the  Donington  country  was  in  existence,  there  appear 
to  have  been  some  neutral  coverts,  and  one  day  Lord 
Hastings  and  Mr.  Hodgson  clashed  in  their  appoint- 
ments, each  having  arranged  to  meet  at  Bunny  Park. 
Mr.  Hodgson  met  the  marquis  before  the  day  appointed, 
when,  each  offering  to  withdraw,  it  was  agreed  instead 
that  each  should  bring  ten  couples  of  hounds,  which 
should  hunt  together,  the  merits  of  each  pack  to  be 
decided  upon  by  some  disinterested  party.  This  friendly 
trial,  however,  never  came  off,  as  a  frost  intervened,  and 
put  a  stop  to  hunting  altogether. 

As  already  mentioned,  Mr.  Hodgson  was  exceedingly 
successful  during  his  short  mastership  in  showing  sport, 
and  in  January  1840,  meeting  at  Bardon  Hill,  after  a 
poorish  morning,  hounds  found  a  good  fox  in  the 
Outwoods. 

The  fox  was  soon  viewed  away,  going  as  though  over  the 
Beacon  Hill,  but  then  headed  back,  going  on  straight  through 
the  Outwoods,  and  crossing  the  Loughborough  Road,  as  if  for 
Garendon.  He  then  changed  his  course,  bearing  to  his  right,  as 
if  he  would  go  to  Loughborough,  and  again  turning  to  the  right 
he  crossed  the  road  at  Loughborough  town  end.  Going  on  at  a 
killing  pace  he  crossed  Beaumanor,  through  the  coverts,  not  delay- 
ing a  moment,  but  setting  his  head  straight  for  Quorn  Wood,  with 
the  pack  close  at  his  brush.  Running  in  view  for  three  or  four 
fields  the  hounds  eventually  killed  him  on  the  road,  within  a  few 
hundred  yards  of  Quorn,  after  an  exceedingly  fast  thirty-five 
minutes,  during  which  the  hounds  ran  away  from  the  horses. 


MR.    THOMAS    HODGSON  189 

This  run,  it  should  be  said,  as  well  as  some  other 
good  ones,  took  place  before  Webb  left  Mr.  Hodgson. 

Lord  Gardner  was  one  of  Mr.  Hodgson's  constant 
attendants,  as  he  had  been  of  his  predecessor's,  and  was 
noted  for  the  fineness  of  his  hands,  and  the  boldness 
of  his  horsemanship.  On  Thursday,  December  3,  1840, 
however,  when  the  hounds  met  at  Keythorpe,  Lord 
Gardner  sustained  a  very  bad  fall  at  Knowsley  Brook, 
and  it  might  have  been  attended  with  very  serious  con- 
sequences. He  rather  liked  water,  and  riding  hard  up 
to  the  brook,  at  one  of  the  widest  parts,  his  horse  slipped 
back  and  fell  on  him.  He  was  carried  off  in  an  insensible 
condition  to  Mr.  Greene's  house  at  Rolleston,  but  it  was 
not  for  a  day  or  two  that  he  could  be  moved  to  his  own 
residence. 

On  another  occasion  hounds  again  met  at  Keythorpe, 
and  after  an  uninteresting  morning  with  a  ring  fox  found 
about  two  o'clock  at  Shangton  Holt.  In  the  course  of 
the  run  a  particularly  formidable  stake-and-bound  hedge 
came  in  the  way,  and  the  only  two  to  face  it  were  Jem 
Mason  and  Dick  Webster,  the  latter  of  whom  may  be 
remembered  as  often  riding  horses  at  the  London  horse 
shows.  Both  landed  up  to  their  girths  in  a  bog,  but 
managed  to  get  out,  though  Jem  Mason  afterwards  came 
to  grief  at  the  Stanton  Brook.  Not  more  than  half-a- 
dozen  rode  at  it,  but  Jem  picked  out  one  of  the  worst 
places,  where  the  banks  were  hollow,  and  being  once 
immersed  had  to  stay  there  till  some  men  with  spades  dug 
an  exit  for  him.  It  was  on  this  occasion,  when,  find- 
ing at  Shangton  Holt,  two  foxes  going  away  almost 
immediately,  and  the  field  being  anxious  to  do  the 
same,  that  Mr.  Hodgson,  being  on  the  exact  spot,  just 
waved  his  hand,  and  said,  "  I  beg  and  pray,  gentle- 
men, you  will  stand  still,  or  the  hounds  will  never  get 
away."  "  To  keep  a  field  in  order  like  that,"  said 
one    of    those    who    were    out,    "  was    more    than    the 


190  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

1  Squire '   or    Assheton   Smith    could   do   with   all   their 
bullyragging." 

It  was  early  in  1840,  that  is  to  say,  before  the  end  of 
Mr.  Hodgson's  first  season,  that  Dick  Christian  made 
his  celebrated  leap,  mentioned  by  "The  Druid,"  on  Mr. 
Coke's  chestnut  mare  Marigold,  while  out  near  Holwell 
Mouth. 

He  rode  at  a  thick  cut  hedge  four  feet  six  inches  high,  which 
he  cleared  easily  enough,  the  mare  alighting  on  a  bank  about  a 
yard  wide,  with  all  her  four  feet  nearly  together.  Directly  below 
this  bank  was  a  steep  declivity  into  an  old  quarry,  called  Sot's 
Hole.  It  was  said  to  be  about  twelve  yards  deep.  The  failure 
of  the  bank  where  Dick  had  thus  suddenly  deposited  his  whole 
capital  must  have  proved  fatal.  Luckily  it  stood  firmly,  and  the 
mare  bounded  boldly  forward,  reaching  the  bottom  in  three 
springs.  Dick  found  himself  well  fixed  in  the  saddle  when  the 
mare  reached  terra  firma,  and  both  steed  and  rider  were  perfectly 
unscathed.  Dick  is  now  sixty.  The  first  leap  was  18  feet,  the 
second  10  feet  6  inches,  the  third  10  feet,  the  fourth  14  feet  9 
inches;  total,  53  feet  3  inches. 

It  was  probably  owing  to  the  interregnum  which 
ensued  between  the  resignation  of  Lord  Suffield  and  the 
coming  forward  of  Mr.  Hodgson,  that  caused  Melton  to 
be  so  comparatively  empty  during  the  latter's  first  season. 
When  the  opening  day  came  round  and  the  hounds  met 
at  Kirby  Gate,  scarcely  any  old  faces  were  present,  but  the 
master  was  subsequently  well  repaid  when  people  came  to 
know  of  the  sport  he  was  showing,  though  in  some  parts 
of  the  country  he  was  rather  short  of  foxes  ;  while  Lord 
Harborough,  whose  father  had  kept  hounds,  closed 
Stapleford  Park  against  hunting  men,  and  not  only  that, 
but  had  dog-spears  set  all  over  the  place,  which  would 
have  played  havoc  with  any  pack  that  happened  to  find 
their  way  inside  the  demesne. 

It  has  been  already  mentioned  how  urbane  Mr. 
Hodgson  was  ;    but  he  had  very  decided  views  of  his 


MR.    THOMAS    HODGSON  191 

own,  and  would  stand  no  interference  from  anybody. 
On  one  occasion  the  hounds  met  at  Kirby  Gate,  and 
after  drawing  Cream  Gorse, 

Found  at  Ashby  Pasture.  Hounds  crossed  over  a  very  strong 
country,  by  Kirby  Gate,  almost  to  Melton.  Lord  Wilton  and  Mr. 
Smith  both  had  severe  falls,  and  Lord  Gardner,  upon  the  hounds 
coming  to  a  check,  took  upon  himself  the  office  of  huntsman,  and, 
cap  in  hand,  proceeded  to  cast  the  hounds.  As  Day,  the  profes- 
sional huntsman,  was  well  up,  this  was  a  little  too  much  even  for 
Mr.  Hodgson's  proverbial  good  nature,  and  he  very  quietly 
informed  the  noble  peer  that  he  could  not  allow  any  such  inter- 
ference from  anybody,  greatly  to  the  gratification  of  a  very  large 
field.  Were  Lord  Gardner  aware  of  his  own  unpopularity  in 
Leicestershire,  we  think  he  would  not  get  into  so  many  scrapes, 
as  nothing  gives  the  people  there  more  pleasure  than  seeing  his 
lordship  in  a  mess. 

It  was  during  Mr.  Hodgson's  mastership  that,  Mr. 
Assheton  Smith  (who  at  that  time  hunted  the  Tedworth), 
after  paying  a  visit  with  his  hounds  to  Sir  Richard  Sutton 
in  the  Burton  country,  passed  through  the  Midlands, 
and  Mr.  Hodgson  accorded  him  a  meet  at  Rolleston, 
where  something  like  two  thousand  horsemen  were 
gathered  together.  The  old  master  of  the  Quorn 
accepted  Mr.  Hodgson's  offer  with  the  greatest  delight, 
and  Friday,  April  20th,  was  appointed,  Mr.  Greene's 
house  at  Rolleston  being  the  fixture.  Among  the  large 
field  was  Prince  Ernest  of  Saxe-Coburg,  brother  of  the 
Prince  Consort.  The  Leicestershire  farmers  at  once 
spotted  his  hunting-whip,  which  had  a  gold  stag  for  a 
handle,  and  which,  after  the  buckhorns  and  the  iron- 
hammered  whips  then  in  vogue,  could  not  fail  to  arrest 
the  attention  of  the  spectators. 

A  writer  of  the  time  says  that  his  Serene  Highness 
took  umbrage  at  the  fact  of  the  farmers  not  paying  him 
that  deference  to  which  he  was  accustomed  in  his 
Principality  of  Saxe-Coburg.     He  therefore  made  some 


192  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

rather  unwise  remarks  about  farmers  beino-  allowed  to 
hunt,  a  remark  which  amused  the  Leicestershire  people 
immensely,  and  is  certainly  not  on  all-fours  with  the  cut- 
and-dried  statements  one  hears  at  puppy  shows  and 
elsewhere,  and  the  universally  admitted  fact  that  farmers 
are  the  backbone  of  hunting.  The  Rolleston  meet,  how- 
ever, more  resembled  a  Derby  Day  than  a  hunting- 
fixture.  Coaches  and  carriages  came  pouring  in  from  all 
directions,  and  seventeen  hundred  people  are  said  to 
have  passed  through  one  gate  alone ;  while  another 
division,  which  in  itself  would  have  constituted  a  large 
field,  took  another  route.  About  one-third  of  the  whole 
field  were  in  pink,  and  the  majority  of  the  horses  were 
certainly  entitled  to  be  called  hunters,  though  of  course 
a  good  many  rough  specimens  were  pressed  into  service 
for  the  occasion. 

Dick  Burton  was  on  the  lawn,  surrounded  by  his 
hounds  and  a  number  of  horsemen,  and  when  Mr.  Smith 
appeared  he  was  most  warmly  greeted,  none  giving  him 
a  more  hearty  welcome  than  his  old  friends  the  farmers. 
The  hounds,  it  was  seen,  had  lost  none  of  their  high 
standard.  They  were  very  handsome,  and  possessed 
considerable  family  likeness. 

The  unlucky  Prince  Ernest  did  not  make  his  appear- 
ance until  twelve  o'clock,  a  circumstance  which  caused 
some  delay,  as  Mr.  Smith  waited  for  him.  His  lateness, 
however,  did  not  surprise  those  who  had  heard  that  on 
arriving  at  Lord  Cardigan's  house  a  few  days  before, 
four  hours  after  the  time  fixed  for  dinner,  he  insisted 
upon  having  a  warm  bath  before  he  joined  the  half- 
famished  party  awaiting  his  august  presence.  He  is  said 
first  of  all  to  have  glanced  at  the  hounds,  expressed  his 
astonishment  at  such  a  multitude  of  people  coming  to 
look  at  him,  when,  in  point  of  fact,  writes  one  of  those 
who  were  present,  not  one-third  knew  he  was  there  at  all, 
and  not  one  in  twenty  that  he  was  expected.     He  then 


MR.    THOMAS    HODGSON  193 

retired  to  Mr.  Greene's  for  a  little  needful   refreshment. 
It  was  about  half-past  twelve  when  Mr.  Smith 

Went  to  Shangton  Holt,  drawing  the  bottom  of  the  covert  only, 
and  then  trotted  away  to  Norton  Gorse,  Mr.  Greene's  covert, 
which  was  also  blank.  Stanton  Wood  was  tenantless,  so  were 
Gorleston  Wood  and  Fallow  Close  ;  Voysey's  covert  near  Hallaton 
was  apparently  blank,  and  Mr.  Hodgson  was  so  disgusted  at 
the  bad  luck  which  attended  the  day,  that  he  dismounted,  and 
walking  into  a  part  of  the  covert  where  there  was  some  very  good 
lying,  flogged  a  fox  out  himself.  Hounds  showed  plenty  of  dash; 
the  fox  was  soon  out  of  covert,  and  went  away  towards  Homing- 
hold.  Leaving  it  to  the  left,  he  went  over  some  new  rails,  out  of 
the  road,  into  Mr.  Ouseley's  farm.  This  was  rather  an  awkward 
sort  of  place.  Mr.  Smith  cleared  these  rails,  as  he  would  have 
done  in  his  younger  days,  and  having  landed  on  the  other  side, 
laughed  heartily  at  some  of  the  falls  which  took  place  there. 
Then  the  line  lay  across  the  Bradleys  to  Easton  Park,  where  the 
fox  was  lost;  but  it  was  afterwards  ascertained  that  he  had 
crossed  the  Welland  and  gone  by  Rockingham  Park. 

Prince  Ernest,  it  appears,  was  mounted  on  a  horse  drafted  from 
Mr.  Hodgson's  stud,  and  the  rider,  not  being  accustomed  to  go  from 
covert  to  covert  at  the  rate  of  something  like  ten  miles  an  hour,  got 
his  horse  across  the  road,  and  was  nearly  knocked  over  by  some- 
body who  was  riding  close  behind  him.  "  Do  you  know  whom  you 
rode  against  ?  "  asked  a  friend  of  the  offender.  "  Not  1,"  was  the 
reply,  "  but  I  wish  the  fellow  would  stay  at  home,  for  he  has 
nearly  broken  my  leg."  Then,  again,  in  the  course  of  the  run  the 
Prince,  going  for  a  fence,  crossed  a  farmer  who  meant  taking  it 
almost  at  the  same  place,  but  pulling  up  his  horse  the  latter  went 
a  little  to  the  right,  saying  very  energetically,  as  he  passed  the 
Great  Unknown,  "  D — n  you,  sir,  why  don't  you  keep  your  line  ?  " 
The  Prince,  rather  upset  by  the  farmer's  energetic  words,  rode  up 
to  Lord  Cardigan  at  the  first  check  to  inquire,  and  doubtless 
received  a  satisfactory  explanation ;  but  the  Prince  must  have 
gone  away  somewhat  impressed  with  the  curious  deportment  of 
the  English  farmer,  the  backbone  of  fox-hunting.  This  was  a 
kind  of  festival  week,  as  on  the  following  day  Lord  Cardigan  turned 
out  a  deer  at  Glooston  Wood  for  the  amusement  of  his  visitors. 

The  weather  had  become  so  hot  that  the  foxhounds 
could  do  but  little,   so  the   Marquis  of  Waterford,   who 


i94  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

had  in  the  meantime  purchased  the  staghounds  from 
Mr.  Villebois  out  of  Norfolk,  showed  a  good  deal  of 
sport  around  Melton.  They  had  a  famous  run  just 
afterwards,  of  one  hour  and  fifty  minutes.  The  marquis 
was  riding  a  horse  called  Dusty  Bob,  for  whom  he  had 
a  few  days  before  given  350  guineas.  He  rode  him  on 
this  occasion  for  the  first  time,  with  the  result  that  Dusty 
Bob  gave  his  master  three  rattling  falls  during  the  after- 
noon, and  died  the  next  day.  The  distance  from  Little 
Dalby  to  Sykes's  Spinney,  the  two  extreme  points,  was 
eleven  miles  as  the  crow  flies.  A  few  days  later  the 
staghounds  ran  a  drag  from  Asfordby  to  the  kennels  at 
Melton,  and  some  practical  joker  managed  to  gain  pos- 
session of  the  drag,  which  he  ran  through  the  streets  ; 
and  great  was  the  surprise  of  the  inhabitants  to  see  the 
hounds  rushing  along  on  a  scent,  when  they  had  seen  no 
animal  go  by  ! 

During  the  last  week  in  March  the  Ouorn  met  at 
Widmerpool,  and  in  going  from  Parson's  Thorns  to  the 
Curate's  Gorse,  a  gate  was  found  which  could  not  be 
opened.  Mr.  White  led  over,  and  was  followed  by 
fifteen  men  in  succession  without  a  mistake.  One  of 
those  who  cleared  it  was  a  ponderous  German  baron, 
an  attache  in  the  suite  of  Prince  Ernest,  attired  in  scarlet 
coat  and  blue  trousers.  It  was  said  that  one  of  his 
friends  had  managed  to  find  him  a  pair  of  leathers,  but 
no  boots  were  forthcoming  into  which  the  baron's  legs 
could  be  forced,  so  he  substituted  his  own  blue  trousers. 
He  expressed  himself  very  well  satisfied  with  the  country, 
and  enjoyed  his  ride  extremely. 

The  season  terminated  with  a  week's  hunting  in 
Charnwood  Forest,  in  which  fair  sport  was  enjoyed, 
and  the  Quornites  were  cheered  by  the  intelligence  that 
during  the  following  season  Mr.  Hodgson  would  hunt 
five  days  a  week  ;  his  huntsman  to  go  out  on  three  days 
in  the  open  country,   he  himself  hunting   another  pack 


MR.    THOMAS    HODGSON  195 

two  days  a  week  in  the  forest  and  among  the  wood- 
lands. Mr.  Little  Gilmour  at  this  period  determined  to 
retire  from  Leicestershire,  and  the  Marquis  of  Waterford, 
after  making  Melton  and  other  parts  of  Leicestershire 
ring  with  his  exploits,  announced  his  intention  of  hence- 
forward hunting  in  Ireland. 

Soon  after  the  close  of  the  season  1839-40,  there 
died  in  Leicestershire  Mr.  Rowland,  the  veterinary  sur- 
geon, who  for  something  like  half  a  century  had  enjoyed 
an  enormous  practice  among  the  owners  of  the  better 
class  of  steeds,  and  it  was  said  that  no  man  could  better 
keep  a  "screw"  sound,  or  cure  a  horse  which  had  met 
with  an  accident.  His  memory  was  for  many  years  affec- 
tionately cherished  in  Leicestershire,  from  the  fact  that 
he  brought  about,  if  not  a  revolution,  at  least  a  reform 
in  the  shoeing  of  horses.  Before  his  time  prickings  in 
shoeing  were  so  common  that  it  came  almost  to  be 
regarded  as  a  matter  of  course  in  one  horse  out  of  about 
three.  Mr.  Rowland,  however,  insisting  on  greater 
caution,  asked  for  a  slightly  improved  rate  of  remunera- 
tion, and  in  due  time  induced  all  the  local  farriers  to 
take  more  pains,  with  the  result  that  pricking  became 
almost  as  rare  as  it  is  now. 

Firing  Mr.  Rowland  disliked,  but  when  he  used 
the  irons,  he  used  them,  as  Sir  Harry  Goodricke  once 
said,  "with  such  judgment  and  effect  that  rendered  their 
application  rather  ornamental  than  otherwise."  His  zeal 
for  his  business  appears  to  have  been  as  great  as  his 
love  for  hunting,  for  it  is  said  that  he  had  been  known 
to  ride  fifty  miles  to  see  patients,  meet  the  Ouorn 
hounds,  change  his  horse,  and  then  take  another  long 
journey  on  professional  rounds.  The  story  goes  that 
one  day  Lord  Suffield  despatched  Mr.  Rowland  to  see 
a  lame  horse  of  his  which  was  lying  out  somewhere  near 
Birmingham,  and  on  seeing  him  at  the  covert-side,  re- 
proached  him  for  having  neglected  his  professional  duties 


196  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

for  the  sake  of  pleasure.  Great,  however,  was  his 
astonishment  on  being  told,  "  I  saw  your  horse  at  five 
o'clock  this  morning,  got  him  on  his  legs  again,  and 
have  since  ridden  nearly  sixty  miles,  and  I  hope  to  ride 
as  many  more  to-day  with  your  lordship."  He  remem- 
bered Mr.  Meynell  and  the  Meynellites,  and  he  had 
enjoyed  the  confidence  of  almost  every  master  of  the 
Quorn. 

Mr.  Hodgson's  hounds  showed  some  excellent  sport 
during  the  season  of  1840-41,  although  frost  put  a 
stop  to  a  good  deal  of  hunting  ;  but  this,  on  the  whole, 
was  a  benefit,  as  for  some  reason  or  other  there  was  a 
great  deal  of  disease  among  horses  in  Leicestershire, 
especially  in  Melton,  during  the  season,  and  the  affection 
is  said  to  have  been  analogous  to  pink-eye,  which  has 
ravaged  stables  in  later  times.  The  concluding  months 
of  the  season  were  extremely  favourable,  and  Mr. 
Hodgson  closed  his  career  as  master  of  the  Quorn  on 
Wednesday,  March  31st,  by  meeting  at  Kirby  Gate. 

There  were  only  a  very  few  people  out,  not  more  than  a  dozen, 
among  them  being  Mr.  Assheton  Smith,  Lord  Forester,  and 
Goosey,  the  huntsman  to  the  Belvoir.  The  first  fox  was  found 
at  Gartree  Hill,  and  gave  a  very  fast  run  to  Stapleford  Park, 
where  they  were  stopped,  the  time  being  twenty-five  minutes. 
Then  crossing  the  Wreake  a  fox  was  found  at  Sir  Harry's  Gorse, 
near  Sysonby,  crossed  the  Melton  and  Nottingham  road  near 
Melton  Lodge,  and  went  north  by  Waltham.  Eventually  he  ran 
to  ground,  and  was  killed  one  hour  and  forty  minutes  after  the 
time  of  finding. 

Early  in  the  year  1841  Mr.  Hodgson  decided  to 
resign,  a  determination  which  surprised  a  good  many 
of  the  Leicestershire  hunting  men,  but  the  fact  is  that 
the  country  did  not  suit  him.  Among  the  dykes  of  the 
East  Ridine  he  had  been  accustomed  to  see  these 
hounds,  of  which  he  was  so  fond,  hunt  a  fox  by  them- 
selves with  scarcely  any  interference,  while  the  Holderness 


MR.    THOMAS    HODGSON  197 

sportsmen  gave  them  plenty  of  room  on  the  occurrence 
of  a  check.  He  essayed  something  of  the  same  style  in 
Leicestershire,  and  great  was  his  mortification  on  finding 
his  hounds  overridden  day  after  day  ;  and  it  was  with 
regret  that  he  saw  his  huntsman,  Tom  Day,  forced  to 
adopt  quicker  tactics,  more  in  accordance  with  the  style 
of  hunting;  in  vogoie  in  Leicestershire.  It  was  said  that 
his  resignation  was  due  to  some  action  on  the  part  of  a 
section  of  the  farmers,  but  that  statement  is  incorrect,  as 
with  that  body  he  was  a  great  favourite.  His  departure 
from  the  country  was  partly  due  to  the  above-mentioned 
circumstances,  and  also  to  reasons  of  a  private  nature. 

He  next  went  into  the  provincial  countries  again,  and 
was  made  Registrar  ;  and  in  his  office  the  son  of  many  a 
huntsman  found  a  fruitful  berth.  Before  he  left  Leices- 
tershire he  held  a  sale,  which  was  freely  attended,  and 
both  horses  and  hounds  realised  more  than  was  expected. 
The  bitch  pack  was  bought  for  1000  guineas  by  Lord 
Ducie,  who  was  then  hunting  the  Vale  of  White  Horse 
country.  The  first  lot,  ten  couples  of  dog  hounds,  pro- 
duced no  more  than  200  guineas,  and  were  bought  by 
Mr.  Greene.  The  next  lot  were  bought  in  by  Mr. 
Hodgson  at  490  guineas,  while  the  outgoing  master  also 
bought  in  another  lot  and  a  few  of  the  best  bitches.  The 
rest  of  the  hounds  were  bought  by  Mr.  Greene  and 
Lord  Waterford,  the  latter  of  whom  came  by  train  from 
London  on  the  morning  of  the  sale.  The  aggregate  sum 
produced  by  the  whole  fifty-seven  couples  of  working 
hounds,  fifteen  couples  of  young  hounds,  ready  to  enter, 
and  six  brood  bitches,  was  2201  guineas.  This  sum,  of 
course,  includes  those  bought  in  by  Mr.  Hodgson,  but 
the  hounds  which  changed  hands  produced  something 
over  1700  guineas.  Mr.  Hodgson  went  away  with  a 
very  good  small  pack  in  his  possession  ;  but  his  buying-in 
of  the  hounds  occasioned  some  little  dissatisfaction,  and 
when   he  offered   the    country  for    650  guineas,   the  lot 


198  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

which  he  had  bought  in  for  490  guineas,  the  irritation 
was  scarcely  allayed.  The  horses  are  said  to  have 
realised  thrice  the  money  they  would  have  brought  had 
they  been  sold  at  Hyde  Park  Corner,  the  total  being 
1000  guineas,  which,  considering  the  amount  of  work 
they  had  performed,  and  that  they  had  had  no  rest,  must 
be  considered  as  a  very  good  return.  The  best  were 
bought  by  Mr.  Greene  and  Mr.  Swan,  of  York,  on 
behalf  of  the  York  and  Ainsty  Hunt  ;  while  among 
the  masters  of  hounds  present  were  Lord  Ducie,  the 
Marquis  of  Waterford,  Mr.  Applethwaite,  Tom  Smith 
of  the  Pytchley,  and  the  master  of  the  York  and  Ainsty. 

In  1878  there  was  exhibited  at  the  galleries  of 
Messrs.  Dickenson  and  Foster,  New  Bond  Street,  Lon- 
don, a  collection  of  pictures  entitled  "  Two  Centuries  of 
Hunting,"  among  the  collection  being  a  portrait  of  Mr. 
Tom  Hodgson. 

The  subscription  list,  too,  is  said  to  have  been  rather 
a  sore  point  with  the  retiring  master,  considering  the 
number  of  people  who  came  out  with  the  hounds.  It  is 
believed  that  he  received  something  like  ^3000,  which 
was  more  than  was  given  to  Lord  Southampton,  yet  not 
so  much  as  was  received  by  Sir  Bellingham  Graham.  It 
was  estimated  that  no  man  could  at  that  time  hunt  the 
Quorn  country  under  ^4000  a  year,  while  many  of 
the  previous  masters,  who  went  in  for  something  like 
show,  had  to  spend  a  good  deal  more  than  that. 

The  year  1863  saw  the  death  of  three  veteran  sports- 
men in  Yorkshire,  viz.,  Sir  Tatton  Sykes,  Mr.  Gully, 
and  Mr.  Hodgson,  at  the  respective  ages  of  eighty, 
ninety,  and  seventy.  Mr.  Hodgson  himself  became 
master  of  the  Badsworth  Hunt  at  the  age  of  twenty- 
four,  when  Sir  Bellingham  Graham  resigned,  and  found, 
as  he  expressed  it,  "twelve  couples  of  hounds  and  three 
horses  as  a  nest-egg."  After  three  seasons  with  the 
Badsworth,    he   became    master   of   the    Holderness   for 


MR.    THOMAS    HODGSON  199 

sixteen,  and  of  the  Ouorn  for  two  seasons.  Then  for 
about  a  season  and  a  half  he  hunted  his  old  Yorkshire 
country,  which  he  finally  quitted  in  1843,  and  this 
brought   him  to  about  the  age  of  fifty. 

As  already  mentioned,  he  was  head  of  the  poll  by 
thirty-two  for  the  West  Riding  Registrarship  at  Leeds, 
after  a  tremendous  contest  (in  which  3393  people  polled) 
with  one  of  the  Lascelles  family,  and,  patronising  hunting 
blood,  huntsmen's  sons  found  seats  in  his  office.  His 
friends  used  to  ask  him  in  chaff  whether  he  chose  them 
for  their  handwriting,  or  whether  he  merely  looked  to 
their  backs,   ribs,   legs,   and  feet. 

After  he  returned  to  Yorkshire  he  seldom  if  ever 
spoke  of  the  Ouorn,  or  if  he  did,  he  soon  went  back  to 
Holderness  and  its  foxes  again.  He  occasionally  went  to 
the  hound  shows,  and  was  always  seen  on  the  Doncaster 
stand  or  on  the  drag  of  some  hunting  friend  beside  the 
course  at  York.  At  the  Doncaster  meeting  before  his 
death  he  looked  uncommonly  well,  but  he  told  a  friend 
of  his  of  the  death  of  his  old  brood-mare  Eclogue,  and 
added,  "  It  is  an  omen  for  me" — and  so  it  proved. 


CHAPTER  VII 

MR.  HENRY  GREENE,  OF  ROLLESTON 

(1841-1847) 


CHAPTER    VII 

MR.    HENRY    GREENE,    OF    ROLLESTON 

1841-1847 

THE  accession  of  Mr.  Greene,  of  Rolleston,  to  office 
as  master  of  the  Ouorn  is  remarkable  from  the 
fact  that  he  was  the  only  Leicestershire  man  since 
Mr.  Boothby  who  had  occupied  that  position.  In  many 
countries,  a  little  prior  to  Mr.  Greene's  advent  to  power, 
hounds  were  kept  by  county  men  in  many  cases,  and 
even  now  (1898),  where  there  has  been  a  change  of 
mastership  there  has  sometimes  been  a  clamour  for  a 
county  man  instead  of  a  stranger. 

No  better  choice  could  have  been  made  than  Mr. 
Greene,  for  he  had  been  a  constant  follower  of  the 
hounds  and  could  get  over  a  country  in  good  style, 
was  popular  with  the  farmers,  and  of  course  knew  the 
district.  There  is  some  doubt,  however,  whether  he 
was  an  actual  master,  or  whether  he  was  merely  an 
acting  master  under  a  committee  ;  at  any  rate,  his 
position  was  often  referred  to  as  though  it  were  at  the 
head  of  a  committee,  or  its  representative.  It  may  be 
remembered  that  during  Lord  Suffield's  mastership 
mention  was  made  of  a  suggestion  for  a  committee 
which  should  pay  the  rent  of  coverts  and  damages. 
This  committee  was  no  doubt  elected,  and  one  would 
rather  be  inclined  to  think  that  it  existed  in  Mr.  Greene's 
time,  and  that  he  was  possibly  more  an  acting  than  an 

irresponsible  master  accountable  to  no  one. 

203 


2o4  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

Mr.  Greene,  it  will  be  remembered,  was  a  large 
buyer  of  hounds  at  Mr.  Hodgson's  sale,  and  before  the 
time  for  cub-hunting  arrived  he  had  in  his  kennel  more 
than  seventy  couples  of  hounds,  drawn  from  a  variety 
of  sources.  In  addition  to  those  he  bought  from  Mr. 
Hodgson,  he  had  about  fourteen  couples  from  Mr. 
Drake  ;  twelve  more  from  the  Atherstone,  and  twenty 
from  Mr.  Foljambe,  the  remainder  being  made  up  from 
the  kennels  of  Lord  Yarborough,  the  Belvoir,  the  Vine, 
and  some  hounds  of  the  Duke  of  Beaufort's  blood, 
though  whether  they  came  direct  from  Badminton  is  a 
question  which  cannot  be  easily  settled,  nor  is  it  perhaps 
important  to  do  so.  The  Hunt  servants  had  twenty 
horses  between  them,  and  Tom  Day's  opinion  was  that 
he  had  never  been  better  mounted.  Day  remained  on 
as  huntsman,  and  certainly  had  all  his  work  cut  out  to 
sort  and  discipline  this  huge  scratch  pack.  The  dog 
pack,  which  was  perhaps  the  pick  of  the  kennel,  was 
told  off  to  hunt  the  Harborough  country,  while  a  mixed 
pack,  but  consisting  chiefly  of  bitches,  was  to  hunt  the 
remainder  of  the  district. 

During  the  last  days  of  August  the  hounds  came 
from  Ouorndon  to  the  Billesdon  kennels,  built  by  Lord 
Suffield,  and  met  for  the  first  time  for  cub-hunting  on 
Tuesday,  August  24,  1841,  Rolleston  being  the  fixture. 
They  soon  found  a  fox,  and  by  a  curious  coincidence  he 
was  killed  in  Mr.  Greene's  kitchen  garden. 

The  regular  season  opened  on  Monday,  November  1, 
Kirby  Gate  being  the  fixture.  Not  for  several  years 
had  there  been  so  large  a  field  assembled,  among  those 
present  being  Lord  Gardner,  Count  Batthyany,  the 
Hon.  W.  R.  Wilson,  Messrs.  Hartopp,  Farnham,  Stirling 
Crawfurd,  and  many  others,  who  were  loud  in  their 
congratulations  to  Mr.  Greene  on  the  excellence  of  his 
establishment.  With  regard  to  the  hounds,  Lord  Gardner 
thought  them  most  promising,  while  Goosey  (the  Belvoir 


MR.    HENRY    GREENE  205 

huntsman),  who  came  over  to  have  a  look  at  them, 
declared  that  he  never  saw  a  pack  work  better.  A  fox 
was  found  at  Cream  Gorse  and  gave  a  pretty  good 
run  for  six  miles,  when  he  was  lost.  Barkby  Holt  was 
the  next  draw,  but  nothing  else  to  speak  of  resulted 
during  the  day. 

Melton  had  filled  up  very  well,  but  the  frost  in 
December  sent  most  of  the  visitors  up  to  town  till 
hunting  was  again  possible.  Meantime  a  statistician 
had  gone  round  the  stables  and  discovered  that  Lord 
Wilton  had  seven  horses,  Lord  A.  St.  Maur  (the  late 
Duke  of  Somerset)  eleven,  Colonel  Wyndham  seven, 
Count  Batthyany  eleven,  Count  Moseley  twelve,  Sir 
James  Musgrave  twelve,  Mr.  Crawfurd  fifteen,  Mr. 
Moore  ten,  Mr.  Surtees  ten,  Mr.  Oliver  ten,  Mr.  White 
twelve,  Mr.  Gilmour  twelve,  and  Mr.  Cook  nine.  This 
was  a  great  falling  off  from  the  number  of  horses  kept 
in  olden  days,  when  the  studs  sometimes  amounted  to 
between  twenty  and  thirty,  as  mentioned  in  previous 
chapters.  Melton,  too,  was  then  hardly  what  it  had 
been,  as  many  of  the  followers  of  the  Quorn  preferred 
Leicester  on  account  of  its  railway  convenience. 

By  judicious  heading  and  tailing  Mr.  Greene  had 
cut  down  his  seventy  couples  of  hounds  to  fifty  couples 
of  working  hounds,  and  their  excellence  in  drawing, 
hunting,  and  running  was  universally  admitted.  Mr. 
Greene  rode  well  up  to  his  hounds,  and  so  of  course 
did  Lord  Gardner  ;  and  as  a  follower  pointed  out,  it  was 
wonderful  how  Mr.  Greene  managed  to  eet  alone, 
seeing  that  he  allowed  himself  five  horses  only  for  four 
days  a  week,  while  Lord  Gardner  had  fifteen.  Between 
the  style  of  riding  of  the  two  men  there  was  a  vast 
difference,  however.  Mr.  Greene  rode  with  "Teat 
judgment,  never  taking  a  liberty  with  his  horses,  but 
always  saving  them  as  far  as  possible,  while  Lord 
Gardner,  knowing  that  he  had  plenty  to  fall  back  upon, 


206  THE    QJJORN    HUNT 

delighted  in  riding  to  hounds  in  a  line  by  himself  and 
going  at  everything.  Like  Mr.  Assheton  Smith,  he  was 
quite  unhappy  if  any  one  cut  out  the  work  for  him  ;  but 
he  rode  the  best  of  horses,  and  whether  it  was  plough  or 
pasture  he  galloped  along  at  the  same  pace.  Mr.  Little 
Gilmour  (the  Gentle,  as  he  was  called),  too,  was  well 
mounted,  and  second  to  no  man  of  his  weight ;  and 
then  there  was  Sir  James  Musgrave,  who  always  held 
his  place  in  a  run  ;  while  Lord  Wilton,  whose  fame  has 
been  many  times  sung,  was  quite  in  the  first  class.  But, 
perhaps,  for  a  heavy  man  Colonel  Wyndham  was  about 
the  best  in  the  Hunt,  for  he  rode  twenty  stone,  and  though 
unable  to  cut  down  the  light  weights  could  hold  his  own. 
Of  Day  a  contemporary  writer  spoke  in  highly  compli- 
mentary terms.      He  was  said  to  be  always  in  his  place. 

On  December  9,  1841,  the  Quorn  hounds  placed  an 
excellent  run  to  their  credit,  of  which  the  following  is  an 
abstract : — 

They  met  at  Great  Dalby,  and  found  a  fine  dog  fox  at  Thorpe 
Trussells,  and  from  there  he  ran  by  Great  Dalby,  and  swinging 
to  the  right  went  towards  Burrough  by  Maresfield,  and  on  to 
John  o'  Gaunt,  where  he  bore  to  the  left  for  Halstead,  and  with 
hounds  running  at  a  tremendous  pace  the  line  lay  by  Skeffington- 
highfield,  at  which  point  the  field  were  tailing  terribly.  The  fox 
ran  to  Tugby  Spinney,  where  lie  was  headed,  and  a  check  took 
place,  the  time  to  this  point  being  fifty-two  minutes.  On  Day 
recovering  the  line  it  was  found  that  the  fox  had  turned  to  the 
right,  in  the  direction  of  Rolleston,  crossed  the  covert,  round 
which  he  ran  twice,  while  some  fresh  foxes  rather  complicated 
matters.  Mr.  Greene,  however,  was  fortunate  in  keeping  to  the 
line,  and  as  the  fox  was  endeavouring  to  jump  a  small  brook  a 
hound  pulled  him  down,  after  one  hour  and  twenty  minutes,  over 
as  fine  a  line  of  country  as  could  be  wished  for.  For  the  first  fifty- 
two  minutes,  up  to  check,  and  during  the  last  four  miles,  there 
was  not  a  horseman  within  a  quarter  of  a  mile  of  the  flying  pack, 
and  the  run  was  considered  to  have  been  one  of  the  best  seen  in 
Leicestershire  since  the  days  of  Mr.  Meynell.  At  the  end  of  the  run 
not  a  single  hound  was  missing ;  and  during  the  whole  day  it  is  said 


MR.    HENRY    GREENE  207 

that  the  proverbial  sheet  might  have  covered  them.  Day  was  mute 
with  exultation  at  what  his  hounds  had  done  ;  while  Mr.  Greene, 
who  set  very  high  store  by  his  huntsman,  in  the  evening  sent 
Tom  Day  and  the  whippers-in  a  basket  of  some  old  wine,  which 
had  lain  for  twenty  years  in  the  cellars  at  Rolleston.  The  head 
of  the  fox  was  sent  to  a  taxidermist's  to  be  mounted  in  silver,  with 
an  appropriate  inscription  engraved,  to  commemorate  a  run  which, 
it  was  said,  would  not  be  speedily  forgotten  by  those  who  took 
part  in  it. 

The  last  day  of  the  year  ( 1841)  was  marked  by 
another  excellent  run. 

Meeting  at  Widmerpool,  hounds  soon  found  in  Howthorpe 
plantation,  and  after  some  delay  in  covert,  a  fox  broke  in  the 
direction  of  Cotgrove  Gorse,  a  favourite  covert  of  Mr.  Musters's. 
Skirting  the  gorse  on  the  right,  the  fox  ran  a  circle  round  by  the 
brick-kilns  to  the  Decoy,  and  after  leaving  Kinoulton  went  as 
though  for  Howthorpe,  and  then  turned  short  to  the  left  to 
Kinoulton  Gorse,  which  he  threaded,  and  went  over  the  Fosse  road. 
He  next  pointed  for  Bunny,  thence  to  Kegworth,  which  he  passed 
on  the  right,  and  turned  towards  Normanton  village,  leaving  that 
also  on  the  right,  and  then  swung  short  to  the  left,  as  though  he 
would  go  to  Debdale  Gorse,  a  covert  which  he  passed  one  field  to 
the  right.  Then  he  went  to  Plumtree  village,  close  to  the  back 
of  the  houses,  crossed  the  high-road,  and  went  towards  Tollerton 
Park,  where  he  tried  dodging,  but  the  hounds  were  running  at 
such  a  tremendous  pace  that  he  was  not  able  to  stay.  In  the 
pond  there  is  a  small  island,  and  thither  he  swam,  the  pack 
following  his  example,  and,  before  he  could  get  away,  they  pulled 
him  down.  Day  offered  a  labouring  man  half-a-guinea  to  fetch 
the  fox,  but  the  man,  having  the  fear  of  cold  water  and  the  pack 
of  baying  hounds  before  his  eyes,  laconically  replied,  "  I  dussent." 
Presently  the  second  whip  arrived,  and  that  worthy  man  made  no 
bones  about  it,  but  went  on  to  the  island  and  brought  back  the 
fox,-  his  teeth  (the  whip's,  not  the  fox's)  chattering  with  cold. 
Colonel  Wyndham,  who,  as  usual,  was  up  at  the  finish,  handed 
the  swimmer  his  flask,  with  directions  to  take  as  much  as  he  liked. 
This  run  lasted  for  one  hour  and  fifty-five  minutes,  and,  consider- 
ing that  these  hounds,  which  were  located  at  Quorn,  had  not  been 
out  for  a  fortnight,  they  must  have  had  enough  of  it,  to  say  nothing 
of  the  men  who  had  ridden  over  thirty-three  miles  to  covert,  seen 


208  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

the  run  out,  and  had  to  ride  more  than  thirty-three  miles  home. 
On  the  grass  the  pace  was  fast,  but  as  a  good  deal  of  ploughed 
land  lay  in  the  way,  the  pace,  of  course,  slackened  at  times.  In 
the  absence  of  Mr.  Greene,  Day  went  and  found  another  fox  at 
Round  Hill  Gorse,  whence  another  very  good  run  ensued  for  a 
short  time,  but  scent  died  away,  and  the  hounds  were  taken  home. 

The  master  of  the  Ouorn  be^an  his  second  season 
(1842-43)  by  breaking  a  rib,  the  result  of  his  horse 
having  fallen  upon  him.  He  was  one  day  hunting  before 
the  snow  had  completely  vanished — in  fact,  in  some 
places  it  was  five  feet  deep — and  while  jumping  over  a 
set  of  posts  and  rails  from  a  bridle-road  leading  from 
Holwell  Mouth  to  Kettleby,  the  horse  slipped  off  a  frozen 
bank,  and  catching  the  top  rail  with  his  knees,  fell  and 
rolled  heavily  on  Mr.  Greene.  Luckily  this  was  only 
three  miles  from  Melton,  whither  he  was  taken  by  a 
friend,  and  conveyed  home  in  a  post-chaise  ;  but  the 
broken  rib  and  the  shock  kept  him  out  of  the  saddle 
for  some  little  time. 

Mr.  Greene's  likeness,  by  the  way,  was  painted  by 
Mr.  William  Scott ;  afterwards  engraved  in  mezzotint, 
and  had  a  large  sale. 

How  impossible  it  is  to  satisfy  everybody  is  seen 
from  a  letter  which  appeared  in  Bell's  Life  in  the  year 
1842.  The  writer,  apparently  a  hunting  man,  being,  as 
he  described  himself,  "upon  the  shelf,"  made  up  for 
active  participation  in  hunting  by  reading  all  that  was 
written  on  the  sport.  Bell's  Life  published  a  great  deal 
of  hunting  news,  amongst  it  letters  from  the  Quorn 
country,  and  this  writer  took  exception  to  the  style  of 
the  communications  addressed  to  that  once  all-powerful 
sporting  paper  : — 

I  read  with  "  satisfaction,"  certainly  not  "  unmixed,"  the  pro- 
ceedings of  the  Quorndon,  as  frequently  detailed  by  a  Leicester 
correspondent.  If  that  contributor  to  your  sporting  intelligence 
would  be  less  lavish  of  his  fulsome  panegyrics  on  Mr.  Greene,  and 


MR.    HENRY    GREENE  209 

on  the  members  of  the  Melton  Hunt  (as  it  is  called,  and  is  too  much 
so  in  reality),  I  should  peruse  his  account  of  a  day's  sport  with  much 
more  pleasure.  For  my  own  part,  I  never  could  see  the  merit  of 
a  parcel  of  young  dandified  Nimrods  quartered  at  Melton,  because 
it  is  the  fashion,  joining  in  an  amusement  about  which  they  know 
nothing,  and  care  less  ;  nor  the  fun  of  their  trying  to  get  a  start 
before  the  hounds,  and  nine  times  out  of  ten  pushing  them  over 
the  scent,  unless  it  be  a  burning  one,  and  then  not  one  in  fifty  of 
them  seeing  a  yard  of  the  run.  Did  it  never  occur  to  your  corre- 
spondent that  though  Mr.  Greene  may  be  made  for  the  Melton 
Hunt,  and  the  Melton  Hunt  may  be  everything  to  Mr.  Greene, 
that  the  country  was  not  made  for  either,  and  will  not  submit 
much  longer  to  be  humbugged  by  both,  as  it  has  been.  It  may  be 
all  very  well  to  confine  the  "  meets  "  to  the  grass  country  imme- 
diately around  Melton,  or  that  part  of  it  which  is  in  favour  with 
these  aristocratic  bucks,  exclusively  for  their  amusement,  but 
unless  a  country  is  hunted  regularly,  both  rough  and  smooth,  I 
shall  venture  to  predict,  from  long  experience,  that  it  will  either 
soon  cease  to  be  hunted  at  all,  or  be  subject  to  mutilation.  I  am 
now  speaking  particularly  as  to  the  Widmerpool  side,  which, 
in  Osbaldeston's  time,  afforded  the  best  runs  of  the  season,  and 
now  is  almost  neglected.  The  murmurs  are  loud  in  that  neigh- 
bourhood, and  as  the  adjoining  country,  late  Mr.  Musters's,  is 
without  hounds,  it  will  very  soon  be  without  foxes,  unless  some 
spirited  individual  takes  the  latter  country,  and  begs  for  (which  he 
would  soon  obtain)  the  Widmerpool  side,  away  from  the  Quorn- 
don,  which,  in  spite  of  the  support  it  renders,  in  the  shape  of  a 
weekly  encomium  from  Leicester,  is  in  truth  going  as  fast  as  it 
can  to  the  does.  VENATOR. 


This  somewhat  bitter  letter  certainly  had  beneath  it 
a  substratum  of  truth,  as  for  a  long  time,  as  mentioned 
on  a  former  page,  it  was  always  said  that  the  Melton 
clique  was  all-powerful,  and  that,  so  long  as  they  had  a 
sufficiency  of  fixtures  within  easy  riding  distance  of  their 
headquarters,  they  cared  nothing  about  hunting  on  the 
rougher  side  ;  and  this  was  no  doubt  true,  though 
perhaps  Mr.  Greene  did  his  best  to  free  himself  from 
the  trammels  which  had  surrounded  some  of  the  earlier 
masters. 

o 


210  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

During  the  earlier  part  of  1843  there  was  nothing 
particular  to  chronicle  in  the  sport,  but  for  the  conveni- 
ence of  hunting  men  a  new  hunting  map  of  Leicester- 
shire, together  with  such  parts  of  the  adjoining  counties 
as  are  within  easy  reach  of  Leicestershire  men,  was 
published  by  Messrs.  Brown  &  Hewitt,  the  Bible  and 
Crown,  Market  Place,  Leicester.  The  map  contained 
all  the  new  coverts,  as  well  as  all  the  bridle  -  roads ; 
while  there  was  another  map  of  the  Quorn,  bound  in 
red  silk,  coloured,  and  folding  up  to  fit  the  waistcoat 
pocket. 

If,  however,  there  was  no  particularly  grand  sport  early 
in  1843,  there  was  a  dastardly  attempt  to  stop  hunting 
in  the  early  part  of  January,  when  the  hounds  met  in  the 
south  of  their  country,  not  far  from  Lutterworth.  Some 
man,  half  suspected  to  be  the  occupier  of  a  small  piece 
of  land  in  the  neighbourhood,  caused  a  number  of 
sharpened  stakes  to  be  driven  at  short  intervals  into 
a  fence,  over  which  he  knew  it  was  likely  the  field 
would  jump.  The  sharpened  ends  were  pointed  out- 
wards, so  that  if  a  horse  made  a  mistake  or  did  not 
rise  enough,  it  is  more  than  likely  that  man  or  horse,  or 
both,  would  have  been  impaled. 

The  late  Sir  Watkin  Wynn  made  his  dStit  in  Lei- 
cestershire towards  the  close  of  the  year  1842,  and  his 
second  appearance  with  the  Quorn  was  on  November  18, 
when  hounds  met  at  Widmerpool.  The  runs  enjoyed 
that  day  were  of  no  particular  excellence,  but  it  is  a 
curious  coincidence  that  on  the  occasion  of  Sir  Watkin's 
appearance  with  the  Quorn  a  second  time,  the  hounds 
should  have  run  through  Wynnstay  Gorse,  which  had 
been  planted  forty  years  before  by  Sir  Watkin's  father. 

In  February  1843  the  Quorn  had  some  fair  sport. 
On  the  22nd  they  had  a  long  hunting  run  of  something 
like  three  hours  from  Steward's  Hay,  while  on  the 
following    day    they    had    a    brilliant    burst    of    twenty 


MR.    HENRY    GREENE  211 

minutes  and  another  of  twenty-five  minutes ;  and  on 
the  27th  the  hounds  ran  for  fifty-five  minutes  at  a  great 
pace.  On  March  6,  Prince  George,  the  present  Duke 
of  Cambridge,  was  out,  while  on  March  21a  capital  run 
from  Gartree  Hill  came  to  a  summary  end  by  the  hounds 
having  to  stop  at  Stapleford  Park,  in  which,  by  the 
desire  of  Lord  Harborough,  were  traps  innumerable. 
Lord  Harborough,  however,  does  not  appear  to  have 
been  the  only  person  who  did  not  favour  fox-hunting, 
for  the  story  goes  that  a  gentleman  in  the  county  made 
rather  extensive  plantations  on  his  estate,  and  was 
showing  them  with  some  pride  to  a  man  who  happened 
to  have  once  on  a  time  been  a  hunt  servant.  "Them's 
no  good,  sir,"  said  the  old  man.  "  How  do  you  mean  ?  " 
asked  the  owner  of  the  estate.  "Why,  they  won't  hold 
a  fox  ;  they  are  too  hollow,"  rejoined  the  huntsman.  "  I 
did  not  make  them  to  hold  foxes,"  said  the  proprietor. 
"Then  what  the  devil  did  you  make  them  for?"  mur- 
mured the  old  huntsman,  turning  away  with  a  con- 
temptuous smile.  So  even  at  that  time  fox-hunting 
had  sundry  enemies. 

Towards  the  close  of  the  season  1842,  the  Due  de 
Nemours  and  suite  came  out,  and  with  the  second  fox 
they  had  a  run  of  twenty  minutes,  which  was  only  just 
fast  enough  to  give  the  royal  visitor  a  taste  of  Leicester- 
shire ;  and  he  appears  to  have  enjoyed  his  run  very 
much,  while  accounts  say  that  he  went  very  well.  In 
fact,  whenever  a  distinguished  foreigner  who  could 
boast  of  any  powers  of  horsemanship  at  all  came  to 
England,  he  was  generally  taken  into  Leicestershire, 
just  as  visitors  of  distinction  are  now  trotted  down  to 
the  Crystal  Palace.  A  still  more  enjoyable  royal  visit, 
however,  was  that  paid  by  the  Queen  to  Belvoir  and 
Melton  Mowbray  in  1843.  At  the  entrance  to  the 
latter  place  a  handsome  triumphal  arch  was  erected, 
covered  with  evergreens  and  hung  with  flags,  while  the 


212  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

artist  into  whose  hands  the  decorations  were  entrusted 
evidently  thought  fit  to  impress  upon  her  Majesty  the 
staple  trade  of  Melton  ;  for  standing  out  against  the 
sky,  above  the  arch,  were  two  stuffed  foxes,  emblems  of 
Melton  as  the  mainstay  of  hunting,  and  on  the  front  was 
the  inscription,  "  Albert,  Prince  of  Wales,  England's 
hope  " — the  prince  being  at  that  period  about  two  years 
old  ;  for  the  time  had  not  arrived  for  him  to  don  tops 
and  leathers,  as  he  afterwards  did  in  Leicestershire. 

The  season  of  1844-45  was  marked  by  a  certain 
number  of  accidents,  though  the  number  might  not  per- 
haps have  been  very  much  above  the  average.  Still, 
among  those  recorded  we  find  that  Lord  Canteloupe, 
who  had  been  staying  with  Lord  Wilton,  at  Egerton 
Lodge,  Melton  Mowbray,  was  following  the  Ouorn 
when  his  horse  fell,  and  his  lordship  so  injured  his  eye 
that  when  he  arrived  home  fears  were  entertained  that 
the  sight  was  irretrievably  gone ;  but  such,  however, 
fortunately  did  not  appear  to  be  the  case.  A  little  later 
on  Mr.  Knight,  one  of  the  old  yeomen  farmers,  and  one 
of  the  best  friends  fox-hunting  ever  had,  was  sitting  at 
dinner  when  he  heard  the  hounds  in  full  cry  passing  his 
house.  He  at  once  started  up  to  follow  on  foot,  but  the 
exertion  was  too  much  for  him,  and  he  dropped  down 
dead  a  few  yards  from  his  own  house. 

It  will  have  been  seen  that  the  Ouorn  almost 
invariably  opened  their  season  at  Kirby  Gate,  where 
was  the  residence  of  Sir  Francis  Burdett,  for  a  com- 
paratively short  time  one  of  the  most  regular  followers 
of  the  Quorn.  Sir  Francis's  history  as  a  sportsman  is 
rather  singular,  for  as  a  matter  of  fact  he  was  almost 
fifty  years  of  age  before  he  took  to  hunting.  He  always 
mounted  himself  on  the  best  of  cattle,  and  being  ardently 
fond  of  the  sport  and  having  plenty  of  courage,  got  along 
pretty  well.  It  is  related  of  him  that  on  his  return  from 
his   first    day's    hunting   he   was   so    charmed   with    the 


MR.    HENRY    GREENE  213 

amusement  that  he  expressed  in  the  very  strongest 
terms  his  regret  that  he  should  have  allowed  so  many 
years  of  his  life  to  have  passed  by  without  having,  until 
that  very  day,  had  the  most  distant  notion  of  the  plea- 
sures of  the  chase.  He  was,  in  fact,  so  completely 
wrapped  up  in  hunting  that  he  went  out  with  the 
hounds  every  season,  and  long  after  he  became  feeble 
he  still  kept  a  few  hunters.  That  he,  at  any  rate, 
acquired  some  proficiency  in  the  saddle  may  be  inferred 
from  the  fact  that  he  was  one  of  those  who,  after  a  poor 
day's  sport,  preferred  to  "lark"  home  across  country, 
instead  of  taking  bridle-roads  and  lanes.  This,  if 
somewhat  unsportsmanlike,  according  to  our  modern 
notions,  was  at  any  rate  a  test  of  pluck.  He  died  on 
January  23,  1844,  at  his  town  residence  in  St.  James's 
Place,  at  the  age  of  seventy-four ;  and  it  was  said  that  on 
one  occasion,  when  the  hounds  met  at  some  favourite 
fixture,  he  left  London,  had  a  day's  hunting,  and  returned 
on  the  day  following  to  town  to  his  Parliamentary 
duties. 

The  same  year  saw  the  death  of  another  prominent 
member  of  the  Quorn  Hunt,  Mr.  John  Moore,  who, 
together  with  Mr.  Maxse,  Mr.  Maher,  and  Sir  James 
Musgrave,  made  up  the  four  "  M's "  of  the  Old  Club. 
Mr.  Moore,  although  not  an  old  man,  was  almost 
regarded  as  the  patriarch  of  Melton  and  the  father  of 
the  Quorn,  from  the  number  of  years  he  had  spent  in 
the  county.  He  first  went  there  in  181 1,  and  missed 
scarcely  a  season  until  the  time  of  his  death.  When  he 
left,  Sir  James  Musgrave  was  the  only  surviving  member 
of  the  Old  Club  ;  while  shortly  afterwards  the  Hon. 
Ottway  Cave,  who  was  a  member  of  the  Old  Club  and 
very  popular  at  Melton,  also  died. 

Considering  his  bold  style  of  riding,  Lord  Gardner 
met  with  singularly  few  accidents.  On  November  22, 
1844,   after  the   Quorn    had    met   at  Widmerpool    Inn. 


2i4  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

they  found  at  Parson's  Gorse  and  had  a  capital  forty- 
five  minutes  ;  but  presently  changing  foxes,  they  lost.  A 
second  fox  was  found  at  Ellar's  Gorse,  and  he  gave  a 
very  fast  thirty-five  minutes  to  Cripple's  Gorse,  where  he 
was  also  lost ;  and  it  was  during  this  scurry  that  Lord 
Gardner  had  a  somewhat  serious  fall.  He  was  taking  a 
line  of  his  own,  and,  in  his  usual  style,  galloping  at  a 
great  pace  between  the  fences,  when  his  horse  put  his 
foot  in  a  hole  and  rolled  completely  over  his  rider  ;  but 
luckily  he  was  not  so  badly  hurt  as  was  at  first  imagined, 
for  another  week  or  ten  days  saw  him  in  the  saddle 
ag-ain,  oroino;  as  well  as  ever. 

It  was  somewhere  about  this  time,  though  the  exact 
date  cannot  be  ascertained,  but  it  was  probably  either 
1844  or  1845,  during  the  mastership  of  Mr.  Greene, 
that  Tom  Day,  hunting  the  Ouorn  hounds,  found  a  fox 
at  Bunny  and  ran  him  by  Reddington  and  Plumptree  to 
Tollerton  ;  and  on  the  same  day  Mr.  Musters  found  a 
fox  at  Edwalton  and  was  running  him  towards  Cotgrove, 
when  either  his  hounds  got  on  the  line  of  the  Quorn 
run  fox,  or  vice  versa. 

Both  packs,  however,  immediately  joined,  and  with  sterns 
down  and  up  wind  ran  well  together  by  Clipstone  and  Nor- 
manton,  and  pulled  the  fox  down  in  less  than  ten  minutes  from 
the  fusion  of  the  two  packs,  near  the  Melton  turnpike  road.  It 
was  a  curious  scene ;  the  old  Squire  and  Tom  Day,  of  course, 
each  claimed  the  run  fox.  They  rode  side  by  side,  taking  their 
fences  almost  together,  with  all  the  keen  ardour  which  had  always 
possessed  them,  each  recognising  and  pointing  to  his  favourite 
hounds ;  each  riding  for  the  fox  as  if  it  was  his  own,  and  cheering 
on  his  hounds.  The  finish  came  soon  afterwards.  Day  jumped 
off  his  horse,  and  went  quickly  after  the  fox  into  the  plantation, 
the  Squire  keeping  as  close  as  he  could  to  Day.  The  latter 
seized  the  fox  and  exclaimed,  "  It  is  my  fox,  Squire ;  I  will 
swear  it  at  the  Day  of  Judgment  " — and  he  strutted  along  holding 
it  in  his  hand,  the  Squire  walking  at  his  side,  and  there  was  no 
further  wrangling,  except  by  the  hounds  eating  him.  Then  came 
another  pleasant  scene,  the  Squire  and  Day  drawing,  by  alternate 


MR.    HENRY    GREENE  215 

calls,  their  respective  hounds,  each  hound  answering  to  his  name 
directly.  All  feelings  of  jealousy  were  banished,  courtesies  were 
exchanged,  and  each  pack  departed  on  its  way  home. 

All  hunts  have  their  characters,  and  the  Ouorn 
included  one,  by  name  Benjamin  Fouldes,  a  frame-work 
knitter.  In  his  native  village  of  Woodhouse  Eaves, 
near  Loughborough,  and  indeed  beyond  the  confines  of 
that  small  place,  he  had  quite  a  reputation  on  account  of 
his  remarkable  zeal  for  fox-hunting.  Whether  it  was 
that  the  propinquity  to  the  kennels  gave  a  sporting 
turn  to  the  inhabitants  of  Woodhouse  Eaves,  or  whether 
they  were  affected  with  the  sporting  proclivities  of 
Leicestershire  in  Qeneral,  matters  not,  but  no  sooner 
was  it  known  that  the  hounds  were  to  meet  anywhere 
near  at  hand  than  the  whole  village  turned  out  in  great 
number,  the  stockingers  leaving  their  dusty  frames  for 
the  purer  air  of  Charnwood  Forest  and  its  heights. 
Foremost  ever  amongst  these  was  Fouldes,  who  always 
"hunted  in  scarlet,"  and  for  many  years  none  of  the 
pedestrian  followers  could  beat  him.  He  was  well 
known  to  nearly  all  the  members  of  the  Hunt,  who 
had  a  kindly  word  for  him,  and  often  expressed  their 
esteem  for  him  in  more  tangible  form.  He  had  a  good 
deal  of  ready  wit  about  him,  and  was  a  general  favourite. 
He  died  on  March  15,  1846,  at  the  age  of  seventy-nine. 
For  some  reason  or  other  he  had  always  taken  a  great 
interest  in  the  future  of  the  Hunt,  and  when  it  was 
rumoured  that  the  country  was  offered  to  Sir  Richard 
Sutton,  he  heard  the  intelligence  with  the  greatest 
possible  satisfaction,  although  it  was  by  no  means 
certain  that  he  had  ever  seen  Sir  Richard,  who  was 
then  hunting  the  Cottesmore  country.  Be  that  as  it 
may,  however,  he  to  the  last  expressed  his  hope  that 
Sir  Richard  Sutton  would  hunt  the  Quorn  in  succession 
to  Mr.  Greene. 


216  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

In  due  course  old  Benjamin  Fouldes's  wish  came 
to  pass  ;  the  country  was  offered  to  Sir  Richard  and 
accepted  by  him.  The  hounds  and  horses  belonging 
to  the  Quorn  were  sold  at  the  Billesdon  kennels  by 
Mr.  Tattersall  on  March  31,  1847.  The  kennel  com- 
prised about  eighty  couples  of  hounds  and  thirty  horses, 
but  the  stock  did  not,  however,  fetch  any  very  great 
amount  of  money.  The  working  hounds  brought 
,£479,  1  7s.  ;  the  unentered  hounds,  £49,  9s.  ;  while  the 
horses  realised  ^1083,  3s.;  the  total  for  hounds  and 
horses  being  ^1612,  9s.,  a  very  moderate  price  for  a 
complete  Quorn  establishment. 

Mr.  Greene  lived  till  November  7,  1861,  when  he 
died  somewhat  suddenly,  his  death  being  a  great  shock 
to  the  neighbourhood.  The  hounds  had  met  at  Rolles- 
ton,  his  residence,  for  the  first  time  during  the  season,  on 
the  day  of  his  death,  and  he  had,  as  was  his  custom, 
provided  a  breakfast  for  any  who  chose  to  come,  and  he 
appeared  to  be  in  good  health  and  spirits.  The  hounds 
drew  his  gorse,  about  a  quarter  of  a  mile  from  his  own 
house,  and  found  a  good  fox  ;  he  went  away  in  the  direc- 
tion of  Skeffington.  Mr.  Greene  had  not  ridden  very 
much  of  late,  so  he  quietly  galloped  on  the  road  towards 
Skeffington,  and  on  reaching  that  place  he  felt  ill,  and 
was  recommended  to  take  some  brandy,  which  he  did, 
but  finding  himself  no  better,  turned  his  horse's  head 
towards  home,  luckily  not  more  than  two  miles  distant, 
and  dismounted  in  his  own  yard,  ordering  his  servant 
to  fetch  the  doctor.  He  walked  into  his  dining-room, 
and  in  less  than  ten  minutes  was  dead,  the  cause  being 
angina  pectoris.  He  was  about  sixty-six  years  old 
at  the  time  of  his  death.  Mention  has  already  been 
made  of  his  riding,  which  was  spoken  of  in  terms  of 
encomium  by  such  thrusters  as  Assheton  Smith  and 
Dick  Christian,  both  of  whom  admired  the  manner  in 
which   he  crossed    the    country ;    while    Lord   Gardner, 


MR.    HENRY    GREENE 


217 


who  was  no  flatterer,  declared  that  Mr.  Greene  was  the 
best  master  the  Ouorn  ever  had.  Towards  the  end  of 
his  life  he  lived  a  great  deal  in  London,  and  was  very 
constant  in  his  attendance  at  Boodle's,  where  he  was 
one  of  the  foremost  authorities  on  fox-hunting  laws,  he 
being  one  of  the  Fox-hunting  Committee  of  that  club. 
A  very  few  weeks  after  his  death  came  the  severing 
of  the  last  link  which  connected  Mr.  Greene  with  the 
Ouorn,  except  that  his  memory  was  long  cherished  by 
those  who  had  known  him.  Rolleston  Hall  passed  into 
new  hands,  and  just  about  Christmastide  the  contents  of 
the  house  were  put  up  to  auction.  The  natural  desire  to 
obtain  some  memento  of  so  good  a  sportsman  no  doubt 
accounted  in  part  for  the  good  prices  realised,  while  a 
considerable  amount  of  amusement  was  caused  when  a 
"  portrait  of  a  neighbouring  nobleman "  (probably  a 
former  Lord  Harborough)  was  put  in  at  tenpence. 


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CHAPTER    VIII 

SIR    RICHARD    SUTTON    (1847-1856) 


2x9 


CHAPTER    VIII 

SIR    RICHARD    SUTTON 

1847-1856 

TRUE  indeed  is  the  saying  that  "when  one  door 
shuts  another  opens."  The  Quorn  men  were  in 
mourning  for  Mr.  Greene,  the  like  of  whom  many  of 
them  thought  that  they  would  never  see  again,  and  the 
majority  were  quite  unprepared  for  the  good  fortune 
which  was  in  store  for  them.  Sir  Richard  Sutton,  an 
excellent  all-round  sportsman  and  a  man  of  great  wealth, 
had  for  five  years  hunted  the  adjoining  Cottesmore 
country,  having  taken  it  after  the  venerable  Earl  of 
Lonsdale ;  and,  on  the  resignation  of  Mr.  Greene, 
thinking  that  he  would  prefer  the  Quorn  country, 
signified  his  willingness  to  fill  the  position  previously 
occupied  by  Mr.  Greene.  Needless  to  say  the  offer 
was  accepted  with  alacrity,  and  at  the  close  of  the  season 
1846-47,  Sir  Richard  transferred  his  establishment  to 
Quorn. 

Here  at  least  was  no  scratch  pack,  such  as  had, 
with  very  few  exceptions,  hunted  the  Quorn  country 
since  Lord  Foley's  time  (1807).  The  foundation  of  Sir 
Richard  Sutton's  pack  had  been  laid  many  years  before. 
He  succeeded  Mr.  Assheton  Smith  in  the  Burton  country 
in  1824,  buying  from  him  very  many  of  his  hounds,  and,  by 
careful  and  judicious  breeding,  raised  the  pack  to  a  hioh 
standard,  for  his  interest  in  his  kennel  was  very  oreat, 


222  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

Sir  Richard  had  something  like  eighteen  years  in  Lin- 
colnshire in  which  to  get  his  kennel  into  order,  and  when 
he  appeared  in  the  Cottesmore  country  in  1842  he 
showed  the  men  of  the  Midlands  a  pack  of  hounds  which 
for  symmetry  and  working  qualities  could  scarcely  be 
excelled  ;  and  these  were  the  hounds  he  took  into  the 
Quorn  country.  It  may  be  mentioned  en  passant  that 
Sir  Richard  Sutton  estimated  that  in  thirty-two  years 
or  thereabouts,  during  which  he  had  been  a  master  of 
hounds,  he  had  expended  no  less  a  sum  than  ^"300,000 
on  fox-hunting. 

In  accordance  with  precedent,  a  dinner  was  orga- 
nised, and  took  place  on  the  17th  November,  to  welcome 
Sir  Richard  Sutton  to  the  Quorn  country  ;  while  it  was 
made  to  serve  a  twofold  purpose  by  celebrating  the 
advent  of  Mr.  Henley  Greaves  to  the  Cottesmore,  in 
succession  to  Sir  Richard  Sutton.  This  dinner,  which 
took  place  at  the  George  Hotel,  Melton,  does  not 
appear  to  have  been  very  well  attended ;  but  under 
the  chairmanship  of  Colonel  Wyndham  --he  rode 
over  twenty  stone,  and  invariably  held  a  good  place — 
things  passed  off  pleasantly  enough.  In  proposing  the 
health  of  the  new  master,  the  colonel  remarked  that 
he  had  brought  with  him  into  the  country  a  pack 
of  hounds  second  to  none,  and  a  large  family  which 
were  treading  in  their  father's  footsteps.  Mr.  Greaves' 
health  was  of  course  proposed,  he  being  a  sort  of  joint 
guest,  and  so  was  that  of  Mr.  Greene,  the  ex-master  of 
the  Quorn. 

Sir  Richard  Sutton  and  his  hounds  were  not  long-  in 
settling  down  in  their  new  country  ;  but  Melton  Mow- 
bray itself  was  not  so  full  as  might  have  been  expected, 
considering  the  prestige  of  the  new  master.  Some  careful 
statistician,  who  for  some  years  appears  to  have  made 
the  round  of  the  different  stables,  estimates  that  there 
were  seventy  fewer  horses  than  in  the  previous  season, 


SIR    RICHARD    SUTTON  223 

and  many  fewer  than  there  were  in  Sir  Harry  Good- 
ricke's  day,  when  he  himself  headed  the  list  with 
upwards  of  half  a  hundred,  and  Lord  Forester  owned 
thirty-eight. 

For  many  years  previous  to  Sir  Richard  Sutton 
taking  the  Quorn,  the  first  Sunday  in  November  was 
always  a  noted  date  for  arrivals  at  Melton.  On  that  day 
the  first  dinner  of  the  season  was  held  at  the  Old  Club, 
and  the  older  members  of  the  Ouorn  Hunt  made  it  a 
point  of  conscience  to  be  present. 

The  rumbling  of  wheels  and  the  measured  trot  of 
post-horses  along  the  Melton  streets  had  been  aforetime 
a  sign  of  the  times  ;  but  in  Sir  Richard  Sutton's  day  the 
train  did  duty  instead,  and  so  the  excitement  of  awaiting 
fresh  arrivals  was  necessarily  discounted. 

Some  lines  in  connection  with  "the  four  Ms"  have 
already  been  quoted,  and  of  Sir  James  Musgrave  it  is 
related  that  he  once  came  to  grief  over  a  fence,  and 
broke  his  collar-bone.  Finding  himself  unable  to  ride 
any  of  his  tolerably  numerous  steeds,  he,  like  the  good 
sportsman  he  was,  wrote  to  a  friend  in  London  to  come 
down  to  ride  his  horses  while  he  was  on  the  shelf;  and  the 
friend  promptly  responded,  only  too  glad  to  shake  from 
his  feet  the  smut  and  dust  of  the  metropolis.  He  arrived, 
provided  with  an  equipment  fitting  him  to  take  the  field 
with  such  a  fashionable  pack  as  the  Ouorn,  and  one 
morning  started  for  the  covert-side,  two  of  Sir  James 
Musgrave's  best  horses  having  been  sent  on  for  him. 
He  had  a  fall  at  the  first  fence,  and  broke  his  collar-bone, 
and  so  the  two  friends,  in  fine  hunting  weather,  sat  and 
nodded  at  each  other  from  easy-chairs  placed  at  opposite 
sides  of  the  hearth  in  the  hospitable  mansion  of  Sir 
James  at  Melton. 

The  season  1847-48  was  exceptionally  mild,  and 
so,  after  Christmas,  foxes  took  to  forsaking  their  usual 
haunts  in  favour  of  the  open,  when,  of  course,   it  was. 


224  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

not  always  easy  for  a  huntsman  to  put  his  hand  upon 
one  just  when  he  was  wanted.  Early  in  January  1848 
"  Sir  Richard  Sutton  and  his  chopfallen  breed  were 
retiring  from  one  of  these  scenes  of  disappointment," 
when  a  holloa  back  was  heard,  and  every  one  thought 
that  the  pack  had  overdrawn  a  fox.  The  hounds 
were  taken  back  in  hot  haste  to  the  covert,  and  the 
master  found  some  grinning  yokels,  who  had  given  a 
false  alarm,  and  to  see  the  hounds  and  the  field  come 
rushing  back  amused  them  mightily.  Some  of  the  field, 
however,  regarding  this  as  a  rather  poor  joke,  somewhat 
unwisely  proceeded  to  thrash  the  countrymen  with  their 
whips,  and  a  regular  scrimmage  ensued,  one  gallant  cap- 
tain, who  was  riding  with  a  cutting-whip,  using  it  with 
such  effect  that  he  was  reported  to  have  nearly  flayed 
the  unlucky  individual  whom  he  selected  for  punishment. 
This  was  the  substance  of  the  first  report,  but  a  "  Lei- 
cestershire farmer"  in  the  Harborough  country  put  a 
somewhat  different  complexion  on  the  business.  He 
explained  that  after  the  hounds  had  drawn  a  certain 
covert  blank,  the  foot  people  began  to  holloa,  and  were 
civilly  requested  by  Sir  Richard  Sutton  and  others  to 
discontinue  their  noise.  When  the  hounds  were  about 
three  or  four  fields  from  the  covert,  the  holloaing  began 
again,  and  so  sundry  farmers,  and  not  the  "  pinks," 
turned  back  and  administered  condign  punishment  to 
the  natives  who  gave  tongue  all  too  freely.  The 
farmers  considered  the  hoax  an  insult  to  the  master, 
and  dealt  with  it  accordingly. 

Of  Sir  Richard  Sutton  the  story  has  been  told  by 
Mr.  Bromley  Davenport  how,  during  his  early  days  of 
mastership  of  the  Ouorn,  on  being  asked  whether  So- 
and-so,  a  new  arrival,  could  ride,  he  replied,  "  I  don't 
know ;  I  have  not  seen  him  go  ;  but  I  should  think  he 
could,  for  he  hangs  a  very  good  boot." 

Sir  Richard,  too,  was  once  heard,  on  arriving  at  a 


SIR    RICHARD    SUTTON  225 

fixture,    to   put   the   following    questions    to    his    second 
horseman  : — 

"  Many  people  out  ?  " 

"A  great  many,  Sir  Richard." 

"  Ugh  !     Is  Colonel  F out  ?  " 

"Yes,  Sir  Richard." 

"  Ugh  !  Ugh  ! !     Is  Mrs.  B out  ?  " 

"  Yes,  Sir  Richard." 

"  Ugh  !  Ugh  ! !  Ugh  ! ! !  Then  couple  up  Valiant  and  Daunt- 
less, and  send  them  home  in  the  brougham." 

Another  old  story  is  fathered  on  Sir  Richard  Sutton. 
A  writer,  who  vouches  for  the  truth  of  the  statement, 
declared  that  Sir  Richard  Sutton  in  his  hearing  called 
aside  a  certain  gentleman  who  was  not  very  particular 
as  to  how  close  he  rode  to  hounds,  and  warned  him  that 
he  must  be  very  careful  not  to  ride  over  a  particular 
hound,  which  he  pointed  out,  adding :  "I  would  not 
have  him  ridden  over  for  anything." 

The  gentleman  promptly  and  courteously  replied  :  "  I 
will  do  anything  I  can  to  oblige  you,  Sir  Richard,  but  I 
have  a  wretched  memory  for  hounds,  and  I  am  afraid 
that  he  will  have  to  take  his  chance  with  the  rest." 

Sir  Richard  Sutton  entered  to  hounds  Ben  Morgan, 
one  of  a  famous  family  of  huntsmen,  and  his  portrait  is 
to  be  seen  in  Sir  Francis  Grant's  picture  of  the  Quorn. 
Whyte-Melville  says  that  Ben  Morgan  was  with  Sir 
Richard  Sutton  in  the  Cottesmore  country,  and  tells  the 
following-  anecdote  about  him  there  : — 

Many  years  ago,  when  he  hunted  the  Cottesmore  country,  Sir 
Richard  Sutton's  hounds  had  been  running  hard  from  Glooston 
Wood  along  the  valley  under  Cranehal  by  Stourton  to  Holt. 
After  thirty  minutes  or  so  over  this  beautiful,  but  exceedingly 
stiff  line,  their  heads  went  up  and  they  came  to  a  check,  possibly 
from  their  own  dash  and  eagerness,  certainly  at  that  pace  and 
amongst  those  fields  not  from  being  overridden. 

"Turn  'em,  Ben!"  exclaimed  Sir  Richard,  with  a  dirty  coat 
and  Hotspur  in  a  lather,  but  determined  not  to  lose  a  moment  in 
getting  after  his  fox. 

P 


226  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

"Yes,  Sir  Richard,"  answered  Morgan,  running  his  horse 
without  a  moment's  hesitation  at  a  flight  of  double  posts  and 
rails,  with  a  ditch  in  the  middle  and  one  on  each  side !  The  good 
grey  having  gone  in  front  from  the  find  was  perhaps  a  little 
blown,  and  dropping  his  hind  legs  in  the  farthest  ditch  rolled 
very  handsomely  into  the  next  field. 

"  It's  not  your  fault,  old  man  !  "  said  Ben,  patting  his  favourite 
on  the  neck  as  they  rose  together  in  mutual  goodwill,  adding 
in  the  same  breath,  while  he  leapt  to  the  saddle,  and  Tranby 
acknowledged  the  line — 

"  Forrard  on,  Sir  Richard ! — Hoic,  together.  Hoic.  He's  a 
Quorn  fox  and  he'll  do  you  good." 

I  had  always  considered  Ben  Morgan  an  unusually  fine  rider. 
For  the  first  time  I  began  to  understand  why  his  horse  never 
failed  to  carry  him  so  willingly  and  so  well. 

Subsequently  Ben  Morgan  became  huntsman  to 
the  then  Lord  Middleton,  and  showed  excellent  sport. 
He  hunted  Lord  Middleton's  hounds  until  1869,  when, 
on  being  succeeded  by  George  Orvis,  he  went  to  the 
Essex  and  Suffolk  under  Mr.  Carrington  Nunn.  ' 

Ben  Moreen  died  in  1880  at  the  house  of  his  brother 
Goddard,  who  at  one  time  hunted  the  Old  Berkeley. 

Whyte-Melville,  in  a  passage  following  that  quoted 
above,  makes  reference  to  Dick  Webster,  a  very  famous 
horseman,  well  known  in  the  Quorn  country.  Speaking 
of  the  run  in  which  Ben  Morgan's  horse  fell  with  him  at 
the  double  posts  and  rails,  the  famous  novelist  writes  : — 

I  do  not  remember  whether  Dick  Webster  was  out  with  us 
that  day,  but  I  am  sure  that  if  he  was  he  has  not  forgotten  it, 
and  I  mention  him  as  another  example  of  daring  horsemanship, 
combined  with  an  imperturbable  good-humour,  almost  verging  on 
buffoonery,  which  seems  to  accept  the  most  dangerous  falls  as 
enhancing  the  fun  afforded  to  a  delightful  game  at  romps. 


1  Ben  Morgan  was  one  of  the  four  sons  of  old  Jem  Morgan,  who  for  a 
long  time  hunted  Mr.  Conyer's  hounds  in  Essex.  Jem  Morgan  was  the  son 
of  a  Suffolk  yeoman,  a  circumstance  which  may  suffice  to  explain  why  the 
family  gravitated  towards  the  east  country. 


SIR    RICHARD    SUTTON  227 

Even  so  good  a  sportsman  as  Sir  Richard  Sutton 
found  himself  unable  to  please  everybody.  On  the 
29th  December  1847,  in  Sir  Richard's  first  season,  the 
hounds  were  due  to  meet  at  the  Shearsby  Sun,  a  fixture 
attended  by  a  good  many  Atherstone  and  Pytchley  men, 
among  the  visitors  being  a  sportsman  who  subsequently 
figured  in  print  as  an  "Impartial  Observer."  He  admitted 
that  a  dense  fog  hung  over  the  country,  and  because  Sir 
Richard  Sutton,  deeming  the  weather  too  thick  for  hunt- 
ing, trotted  back  to  his  supplementary  kennel  at  Oadby, 
the  itinerant  hunting-man  waxed  exceeding  wroth,  and 
declared  how  different  would  have  been  the  action  of 
Mr.  Osbaldeston  or  Sir  Harry  Goodricke  in  like  circum- 
stances. There  was  a  P.S.  to  the  letter  to  the  effect 
that  the  Pytchley,  Atherstone,  and  Warwickshire  had 
good  runs  on  the  day  in  question.  This  letter  was 
answered  by  another,  the  writer  stating  that  on  account 
of  the  fog  the  Pytchley  never  drew  a  covert  all  day  ; 
while  this  was  followed  by  another  communication,  from 
a  farmer  who  was  out  with  the  Pytchley,  giving  the 
details  of  a  very  good  run  which  took  place  on  the 
Friday  in  question  ! 

Scarcely  had  the  season  1848-49  begun  than  a  some- 
what unusual  circumstance  occurred  with  Sir  Richard 
Sutton's  hounds — they  were  no  longer  called  the  Ouorn. 
They  met  at  Ratcliffe.  After  a  good  thirty  minutes 
with  the  first  fox,  another  was  found  at  Hoi  well  Mouth, 
whence  hounds  ran  at  a  good  pace  up  Broughton  Hill 
Side  and  over  Wartnarbey  Stone  Pits  to  a  small  planta- 
tion in  which  the  discharge  of  a  double-barrelled  gun 
was  heard,  and  it  was  then  found  that  a  farmer  had  shot 
the  fox.  Lord  Forester,  who  was  out,  "  named  "  another 
delinquent  who  lived  close  to  Melton  Mowbray,  and 
stated  that  not  only  had  he  been  guilty  of  the  same  act 
before,  but  had  publicly  boasted  of  his  success  as  a 
vulpicide.      This  man  chanced  to  be  out  on  the  occasion 


228  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

of  the  fox  being  shot,  and  was  pointed  out  by  Ben 
Morgan  as  well  in  a  fit  of  righteous  indignation.  Not 
far  off  a  brace  of  dead  foxes  were  found  hanofinpf  on  a 
tree.  Several  other  cases  of  fox-kill insf  having  taken 
place,  several  people  turned  their  backs  on  Melton, 
among  them  being  Mr.  Palk,  Mr.  Surtees,  Lord  New- 
port, Sir  Walter  Carew,  Mr.  Coke,  Mr.  Leslie,  Mr. 
Stirling  Crawford,  Mr.  Oliver  Massey,  Captain  Forester, 
and  some  others.  The  mania  for  killing  foxes  was  not 
at  this  period  confined  to  the  Quorn  country,  for  the 
masters  of  the  Pytchley,  Atherstone,  and  Warwickshire 
Hunts  complained  of  the  same  thing,  and  this  while  old 
oats  were  realising  from  28s.  to  32s.  a  quarter,  beans, 
hay,  and  straw  also  bringing  remunerative  prices.  Esti- 
mates of  expenditure  are  not  perhaps  to  be  depended  upon 
for  strict  accuracy,  but  some  one  in  Leicester  who  took 
the  trouble  to  make  inquiries  stated  that  the  Pytchley, 
Warwickshire,  and  Atherstone  Hunts  caused  the  circu- 
lation of  no  less  a  sum  than  ,£90,000  in  each  country, 
whilst  the  money  spent  in  connection  with  the  Quorn 
involved  the  circulation  of  ,£120,000  a  year,  making  an 
estimated  total  of  ^"390,000  for  the  four  hunts. 

Meantime  Sir  Richard  Sutton's  hounds  enjoyed 
excellent  sport,  the  season  1849-50  being  especially 
prolific  in  good  runs. 

On  Friday,  1 6th  November  1849,  hounds  met  at  Houghton, 
and  finding  a  fox  at  Shangton  Holt  ran  once  or  twice  round  the 
covert,  the  fox  next  making  for  Hardwickes,  and  then,  turning 
to  the  right  for  Staunton  Lodge,  crossed  the  brook  for  Tur 
Langton,  but  left  that  place  on  the  right  of  Church  Langton,  and 
after  leaving  Kibworth  crossed  a  turnpike  road  between  that  place 
and  Glen,  and  passing  in  succession  Lower  Kibworth,  Kibworth 
Harcourt  Church,  and  Carlton  Clump,  went  to  ground  in  a  drain 
at  Smeaton,  an  hour  and  twenty-five  minutes  from  the  time  of 
finding.  The  first  fifteen  minutes,  however,  were  occupied  in 
running  rings  ;  but  for  the  last  hour  and  ten  minutes  hounds  ran 
as  hard  as  they  could  go ;  drew  away  from  the  field  and  had  all 
the  fun  to  themselves,  there  being  no  one  near  them  when  the 


SIR    RICHARD    SUTTON  229 

fox  was  marked  to  ground.  The  only  person  who  was  within 
half-a-dozen  fields  of  the  pack  after  the  first  ten  minutes  was 
Mr.  Edward  Cheney,  who  was  "  warmly  congratulated  by  Sir 
Richard  on  his  attempt  to  catch  the  hounds." 

The  close  of  December  1849  brought  with  it  more 
good  sport,  as  among  others  the  hounds  had  a  run  of 
over  two  hours,  and  it  was  fast,  time  and  distance  being 
taken  into  account.  The  season  1S49  50  was  brought 
to  an  end  with  a  good  run  of  about  an  hour  and  ten 
minutes  ;  and  an  informal  dinner,  at  which  about  fifty  or 
sixty  members  of  the  Hunt  attended,  took  place  at  the 
King's  Head,  Loughborough. 

During  the  season  1849-50,  when  the  hounds  met 
at  Ratcliffe,  "two  moustached  and  military-looking 
men  "  were  seen  at  Cossington  Gorse,  and  were  at  first 
thought  to  be  a  couple  of  officers  from  Weedon.  They 
went  fairly  well  through  the  not  very  long  or  fast  runs 
which  comprised  the  day's  sport,  and  then  repaired  to 
Syston  Station,  ordered  brandy  and  water  and  some- 
thing to  eat,  wrapped  themselves  in  fur  coats,  and 
departed  by  train.  The  landlord,  struck  by  their  foreign 
accent  and  appearance,  was  curious  as  to  their  identity, 
and  one  of  them  proved  to  be  Louis  Napoleon,  two 
years  later  Prince  President  of  the  Republic,  and  sub- 
sequently Emperor. 

The  season  of  1850-51,  besides  being  enlivened  with 
much  good  sport,  is  noteworthy  for  a  run  with  a  point 
of  twenty  miles. 

Hounds  met  at  Ratcliffe  on  Friday  27th  December  1850,  that 
being  their  first  day  out  since  the  frost  which  had  kept  hounds  in 
kennel  for  a  week  or  more.  Cossington  Gorse  held  "  the  best 
and  gamest  fox  that  ever  crossed  Leicestershire."  After  going  over 
the  Foss  road  the  hounds  overran  the  scent,  and  a  slight  check 
ensued.  On  the  line  being  recovered  away  went  the  hounds 
towards  Thrussington  village,  and  then  away  for  Ragdalc. 
Turning  a  little  to  the  right  the  fox  headed  for  Hoby,  and  Six 
Hills  was  soon   sighted  ;  and  then  the  line  la}'  away  for  Schoby 


230  THE    QJJORN    HUNT 

Scholes,  Saxelby,  and  Welby  Fishponds.  Just  thirty  minutes  from 
the  start  the  Nottingham  road  was  crossed,  and  by  this  time 
some  of  the  horses  and  riders  had  had  enough,  the  field  having 
tailed  terribly ;  but  this  was  merely  the  introduction  to  the  run, 
and  twenty-two  minutes  after  crossing  the  Nottingham  road 
hounds  were  close  to  Holwell  village.  Sir  Richard  Sutton,  Lord 
Granby,  Lord  Wilton,  and  Mr.  Little  Gilmour  1  were  in  the  front 
rank,  but  no  one  else  appears  to  have  been  very  near  them  at 
that  moment.  From  Holwell  to  Scalford  the  pace  moderated  to 
some  extent ;  another  ten  minutes  at  the  previous  rate  would  have 
left  the  hounds  all  to  themselves.  Hounds,  however,  again  ran 
faster  as  they  swept  into  the  valley  towards  Brentingby,  and 
were  travelling  quickly  as  the  line  lay  in  the  direction  of  Freeby 
Wood,  which  the  fox  did  not  enter  ;  and  then  leaving  Sproxton 
Thorns  to  the  left  he  went  away  towards  Owston,  where,  bending 
to  the  left,  he  made  for  Sproxton  Church.  In  a  farmyard  through 
which  the  fox  ran  was  the  carcass  of  a  dead  sheep,  and  the  fox 
actually  stopped  to  have  a  bite  as  he  went  along.  Passing  through 
Saltby  village  and  going  on  till  within  a  couple  of  miles  of 
Bescoby  Oaks  the  fox  swung  short  to  the  right,  and  running  to 
the  right  of  Swallow  Hole  crossed  Saltby  Heath,  ran  between 
Humberstone  Gorse  and  Tipping  to  the  Three  Queens,  and  was 
eventually  pulled  down  in  a  field  adjoining  the  road  leading  from 
Denton  to  Hungerton  Old  Hall,  Harlaxton  perhaps  being  the 
place  at  which  the  run  may  be  said  to  have  finished.  At  Denton 
Park  it  was  said  that  the  fox  was  on  one  side  of  a  fence  and  the 
hounds  on  the  other,  but  the  pack  were  so  beat  that  they  could 
not  get  over  the  fence.  It  must  not  be  left  unsaid  that  "  Master 
Egerton,  youngest  son  of  the  Earl  of  Wilton,  was  able  to  ride 
through  the  entire  run."  Horses  and  hounds  were  dead  beat  and 
could  not  possibly  travel  back  to  kennel  that  night,  so  the  whole 
establishment,  as  well  as  the  few  who  had  struggled  to  the  end, 
were  hospitably  entertained  at  Belvoir,  departing  for  their  homes 
next  morning. 

1  Mr.  Gilmour  was  a  Scotchman,  but  early  betook  himself  to  Leicester- 
shire, where  he  belonged  to  Lord  Rokeby's  Club  at  Melton  Mowbray.  He 
was  only  a  young  man  of  about  twenty-three  or  twenty-four  when  "  Nimrod" 
introduced  him  into  the  famous  <2uarterly  Review  run,  but  as  a  matter  of 
fact  Mr.  Gilmour  never  hunted  with  the  Quoin  during  the  mastership  of 
Mr.  Osbaldeston.  The  sketch,  altogether  a  fancy  one,  was  not  written  at 
the  time,  a  circumstance  which  accounts  for  a  mistake  or  two.  Mr.  Gilmour 
was  one  of  Leicestershire's  heavy  weights,  riding  nearly  seventeen  stone,  yet 
he  was  almost  invariably  in  the  front  rank.  He  died  at  St.  John's  Wood  on 
30th  September  1887,  and  was  buried  in  Greyfriars  churchyard,  Edinburgh. 


SIR    RICHARD    SUTTON  231 

Twenty  miles  is  said  to  have  been  the  distance 
between  the  two  furthest  points  of  this  great  run,  but, 
according  to  experts,  hounds  ran  a  distance  of  thirty- 
seven  miles,  while  a  timekeeper  declared  that  it  lasted 
for  four  hours  and  a  quarter  ;  so  there  must  have  been  a 
little  mistake  somewhere,  as  hunters  would  be  unlikely  to 
gallop  nearly  forty  miles  at  a  pace  not  far  short  of  ten 
miles  an  hour. 

In  January  1851  Sir  Richard  Sutton  narrowly  escaped 
a  bad  accident,  through  a  boy  riding  hard  against  him 
at  a  gateway  and  driving  his  leg  against  the  post.  Sir 
Richard  did  not  feel  any  ill  effects  at  the  moment,  but 
by  the  time  he  reached  Lincoln,  whither  he  had  gone  to 
spend  a  few  days,  considerable  inflammation  had  set  in, 
so  a  surgeon  was  sent  for  from  London,  but  some  time 
elapsed  before  Sir  Richard  Sutton  could  ride  again. 

Almost  before  he  was  convalescent,  a  charge  was 
made  against  him  of  buying  foxes  from  a  London  dealer 
and  turning  them  down  in  his  own  country.  In  a  letter 
which  was  printed  in  the  Leicester  Journal,  and  which 
was  headed  "  Scarcity  of  foxes  in  the  North  Riding  of 
Yorkshire,"  an  anecdote  was  related  of  a  young  man  who 
was  desirous  of  having  a  fox.  To  satisfy  his  ambition, 
he  entered  into  negotiations  with  "  an  eminent  dealer  in 
animals."  living  in  London.  The  dealer  wrote  back  to 
say  that  he  had  "an  unlimited  order  for  all  the  foxes 
he  could  ofet  from  Sir  Richard  Sutton."  Sir  Richard's 
solicitors,  on  the  matter  being  placed  in  their  hands,  at 
once  wrote  to  the  Leicester  Journal  to  give  the  most 
unqualified  denial  to  the  statement  of  the  ''eminent 
dealer  in  animals."  They  declared  in  explicit  terms  that 
Sir  Richard  Sutton  had  never  given  an  order  for  a  fox 
to  any  one,  and  that  he  had  never  bought  any.1     That, 

1  In  connection  with  this  subject  it  may  be  interesting  to  point  out  that 
for  some  years  prior  to  the  establishment  of  the  Fox-hunting  Committee  at 
Boodle's  Club,  some  masters  of  hounds  were  in  the  habit  of  dining  together 


232  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

however,  was  neither  the  first  occasion  nor  the  last  on 
which  charges  of  purchasing  foxes  for  Leicestershire 
were  preferred. 

St.  Valentine's  Day  1851  saw  another  good  run  after 
meeting  at  Kirby  Gate.  A  fox  was  soon  found  in  Sir 
Francis  Burdett's  Gorse,  and  while  hounds  were  run- 
ning him  another  fox  jumped  up  and  was  snapped  up  at 
once  ;  but  he  spoiled  the  run.  Hounds  were  then  taken 
on  to  Ashby  Pastures,  where  they  came  across  what  was 
thought  to  be  their  first  fox,  and  away  he  went ;  but  it 
was  not  until  the  expiration  of  two  hours  and  twenty 
minutes,  the  pace  having  been  fast  all  the  way,  that  he 
"was  forced  to  yield  to  the  superior  prowess  and  force  of 
Sir  Richard's  pack  in  a  field  near  Burley  Wood."  This 
run  was  long  enough  and  fast  enough  to  knock  up  most 
of  the  horses,  if  at  least  we  may  trust  the  writer  of  an 
account  of  what  took  place  afterwards. 

One  noble  lord  from  Leicester,  rather  celebrated  for  his  red 
face,  actually  rode  his  horse  to  death  by  the  time  they  reached 
Cold  Overton  Wood,  a  most  cruel  act  in  any  circumstance.  In  a 
few  moments  another,  the  property  of  a  gallant  captain  from  the 
same  town,  dropped  and  died;  while  several  others  were  so  much 
exhausted  as  to  be  obliged  to  be  left  at  barns  or  farmhouses  for 
the  night.  The  scene  on  the  road  home  between  Oakham  and 
Melton  will  not  soon  be  forgotten,  for  here  was  a  game  squire 
flogging  his  noble  animal  before  him  ;  next  was  a  noble  lord  riding 
behind  Mr.  L.  (i.e.  on  Mr.  L.'s  horse),  because  he  had  blown  his 
own  horse,  left  him  behind,  and,  worse  than  all,  got  his  leather 
breeches  so  wet  that  he  could  not  move  one  leg  before  the  other. 


in  London  during  the  season,  and  at  one  of  these  dinners  Mr.  Maberley,  a 
M.F.H.  of  the  time,  was  "sat  upon"  by  some  of  his  brother  masters  for 
having  turned  down  bought  foxes  in  his  country.  In  no  wise  abashed, 
Mr.  Maberley,  quietly  rising  to  his  feet,  said,  "  If  all  the  masters  of  hounds 
will  agree  not  to  purchase  a  fox,  I  will  gladly  put  my  name  at  the  top  of  the 
list  ;  but  so  long  as  it  is  the  universal  practice  to  purchase  foxes,  I  am  neces- 
sarily compelled  to  do  the  same,  and  I  do  not  hesitate  to  declare  that  I  will 
purchase  in  the  best  market  I  possibly  can,  whatever  may  be  the  part  of  the 
island.^  Neither  then  nor  at  any  subsequent  period  does  any  attempt 
appear  to  have  been  made  to  confute  the  speaker's  statements. 


SIR    RICHARD    SUTTON  233 

After  them  came  another  fagging  along,  carrying  his  saddle  on  his 
back,  and  entreating  every  one  who  passed  him  to  send  Brown, 
the  veterinary  surgeon.  At  the  station  end  of  the  town,  no  sooner 
did  a  horse  appear  coming  down  the  Burton  Hill  than  there  were 

cries  of  "  Have  you  seen  my  servant  ?  "     "  D your  servant, 

have  you  seen  mine?"  "  Do  you  know  anything  of  my  master?" 
"  Yes,  he's  just  coming  along."  "  How's  the  horses  ?  "  "  Bunged 
up  and  left  at  Oakham."  "  Where's  the  hounds  ?  "  "  Gone  home 
by  a  special  they  telegraphed  for  from  Stamford."  And  so  the 
game  went  on  until  after  nine  o'clock  at  night ! 

The  year  1851  saw  the  death  of  a  good  sporting 
farmer,  Mr.  Glossop,  who,  though  a  Yorkshireman,  was 
accustomed  to  pay  an  annual  visit  to  Leicestershire, 
when  he  always  went  out  with  the  Ouorn  as  often  as 
possible.  He  was  born  at  Slade  Haston  in  Yorkshire, 
and  though  he  had  to  work  on  his  father's  farm,  he  was 
always  keen  on  hunting.  In  his  own  county  he  was 
regarded  as  a  remarkably  hard  man  to  hounds,  and  in 
Leicestershire  he  well  maintained  his  reputation  ;  and  on 
one  occasion  he  pounded  a  large  field  over  a  big  gate, 
thereby  putting  a  hundred-pound  note  into  the  pocket  of 
Mr.  Bennet  Martin,  who  accepted  the  bet  offered  by 
some  one  else  that  the  "old  Yorkshireman"  would  not 
have  the  gate.  Mr.  Glossop  was  a  capital  judge  of  a 
horse,  and  as  he  indulged  in  dealing  to  a  certain  extent, 
he  enjoyed  his  hunting  at  a  tolerably  cheap  rate.  He 
died  at  the  age  of  seventy-nine,  and  hunted  almost  up  to 
the  last. 

It  will  be  remembered  that  mention  was  made  of  a 
committee  in  the  time  of  Mr.  Hodgson  and  Mr.  Greene, 
and  this  body  would  appear  to  have  existed  in  Sir 
Richard  Sutton's  time  ;  though  their  ostensible  duty 
was  merely  to  pay  covert  rents  and  see  after  them 
generally.  In  a  year  or  two,  however,  after  his  accession 
to  the  mastership,  he  dispensed  with  all  subscriptions — 
became  "  independent  master,"  which  probably  meant 
that  the  committee  dissolved  itself,  and  handed  over  the 


234  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

care  of  the  coverts  to  Sir  Richard  Sutton,  who  thereupon 
bought  and  restored  Ouorndon  Hall,  of  which  he  had 
previously  been  tenant  only. 

By  this  time  (1852)  railways  had  made  their  mark, 
and  so  far  as  Leicestershire  is  concerned  it  was  feared 
that  they  would  deal  a  heavy  blow  to  fox-hunting,  and 
when  the  Midland  line  first  intersected  the  country  from 
north  to  south  the  gravest  fears  for  hunting  were  enter- 
tained. Afterwards  the  System  and  Peterborough  line 
was  opened  to  cut  through  the  eastern  portion  of  the 
country,  and  then  came  the  Leicester  and  Ashby  section 
to  more  or  less  interfere  with  the  western  part.  The  rail- 
ways no  doubt  changed  the  run  of  foxes,  and  were  the 
cause  of  several  inconveniences  ;  but  the  verdict  in  the 
Ouorn  country  was  that  the  advantages  they  offered  in 
the  way  of  transit  and  the  saving  of  fatigue  to  both  horse 
and  man,  in  addition  to  enabling  the  Ouorn  men  to 
make  their  way  to  the  Donington  country  if  they  wished, 
and  to  the  fixtures  of  other  hunts,  counterbalanced  the 
injury  to  hunting  which  they  were  supposed  to  inflict. 

Mr.  Thomas  Craddock,  the  third  of  his  family  to 
be  secretary  of  the  Ouorn  Hunt,  was  by  profession  a 
solicitor;  and  though  he  was  courteous  to  all  the  farmers 
and  kept  them  in  good  humour,  there  was  one  who 
refused  to  become  friendly,  and  he  one  day  sued  Sir 
Richard  Sutton  for  damages  for  riding  over  his  land, 
so  Mr.  Craddock  was  engaged  for  the  defence.  Sir 
Richard,  through  his  solicitor,  offered  the  man  a  liberal 
sum,  which  was  refused  with  the  remark  that  he  "  in- 
tended to  strangle  fox-hunting  altogether."  The  farmer, 
however,  appears  to  have  got  up  his  case  very  badly,  for 
he  souo-ht  to  identify  Sir  Richard  Sutton  by  stating  that 
he  wore  a  hunting  cap  and  a  scarlet  cloak,  a  dress  which, 
Mr.  Craddock  pointed  out,  was  worn  by  many  members 
of  the  Hunt ;  and  as  the  farmer  could  carry  his  case  no 
further  he  was  nonsuited,  or,  in  the  words  of  some  of 


SIR    RICHARD    SUTTON  235 

the  hunting  men  in  court,  was  "grassed/'  and  "saddled" 
with  the  costs. 

In  1852,  too,  Leicestershire  lost  another  of  its 
notable  riders,  Lord  Rancliffe,  who  for  many  seasons 
had  hunted  with  the  Ouorn  ;  in  fact,  for  a  generation  he 
had  been  a  notable  figure  at  all  the  Ouorn  fixtures.  He 
lived  at  Bunny  Park,  and  being  a  very  light  weight,  is 
reported  to  have  always  ridden  Arabs  ;  he  possessed  a 
strong  seat,  beautiful  hands,  and  he  knew  every  fence  in 
the  country,  while  after  dinner  he  was  a  capital  racon- 
teur. On  one*  occasion  when  a  storm  of  unusual  severity 
had  driven  the  field  to  seek  the  shelter  of  a  farm-house, 
and  the  farmer's  wife  was  busying  herself  about  her 
unbidden  guests  to  the  detriment  of  her  own  dinner, 
which  was  in  course  of  cooking,  Lord  Rancliffe  proffered 
his  services  to  see  to  the  piece  of  bacon  and  to  mull  the 
ale,  both  of  which  duties  he  accomplished  to  the  complete 
satisfaction  of  the  good-wife,  who  had  not  the  slightest 
idea  of  the  identity  of  the  amateur  chef.  He  was  popu- 
lar everywhere,  but  dignified  withal,  and  a  local  worthy 
once  summed  him  up  by  saying,  "  He's  a  little  'un  ;  but 
he's  every  inch  a  lord."  Close  by  the  side  of  Bunny 
Hall  stood  a  curious  sort  of  tower,  built  by  Sir  Thomas 
Parkyns,  Lord  Rancliffe' s  great-grandfather,  for  the  pur- 
pose of  seeing  as  much  of  the  hounds  as  he  could  when 
they  were  out  in  that  district,  and  on  the  summit  of  this 
tower  the  old  baronet  and  his  wife  often  enjoyed  what 
they  called  a  day's  hunting.  Lord  Rancliffe  himself, 
too,  when  no  longer  able  to  mount  his  hunters,  used  to 
mount  the  tower,  and  it  was  from  its  battlements  that  he 
gave  his  last  tally-ho  ! 

Ratcliffe,  all  through  Sir  Richard  Sutton's  master- 
ship, appears  to  have  been  a  lucky  fixture,  and  after 
meeting  there  about  the  middle  of  January  1852.  a  first- 
rate  run  began  at  E liar's  Gorse.  It  was  late  in  the  after- 
noon when  hounds  found  after  several  blank  draws,  and 


236  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

chopping-  a  fox  in  Sir  Archibald  Seymour's  Gorse,  which, 
so  far  as  can  be  made  out,  was  planted  to  take  the  place 
of  Munday's  Gorse,  which  had  been  grubbed  up. 

The  Ellar's  Gorse  fox  went  away  over  the  wolds  as  fast  as  his 
legs  could  carry  him,  and  there  being  a  burning  scent,  hounds 
raced  away  at  a  pace  which  a  few  only  of  the  field  could  maintain. 
The  fox  presently  went  down  into  the  vale,  and  was  handsomely 
rolled  over  after  a  run  of  an  hour  and  seventeen  minutes,  the 
distance  being  given  as  seventeen  miles. 

Hunting"  men  of  a  former  generation  may  have  been 
bold  riders  and  very  excellent  sportsmen  ;  but  many  of 
them  were  desperately  bad  timekeepers  or  judges  of 
distance.  Fancy  seventeen  miles  covered  in  seventy- 
seven  minutes — each  mile  in  about  four  minutes  and  a 
half!  Just  afterwards  the  hounds  met  at  Wymeswold, 
a  fixture  which  always  drew  a  large  field,  being  almost 
central  between  Nottingham,  Derby,  Leicester,  and  Mel- 
ton, and  on  the  occasion  in  question  the  officers  of  Lord 
Cardigan's  regiment  mustered  in  force.  The  day  was 
remarkable,  not  only  for  the  afternoon  run,  but  for  the 
fact  that  Sir  Richard  Sutton,  who  was  punctuality  itself, 
was  fifteen  minutes  late.  He,  together  with  Lord  Car- 
digan, had  been  to  his  seat  in  Norfolk  for  shooting,  and 
had  posted  across  country  after  some  hard  work  on  the 
previous  day. 

The  fact  that  Willoughby  Gorse  was  blank  was  less  of  a  sur- 
prise than  a  disappointment.  The  covert  was  situate  on  the 
Wymeswold  estate,  and  the  shooting  was  in  the  hands  of  a 
sporting  baker  who  does  not  appear  to  have  been  even  a  good 
o-ame-preserver,  for  his  coverts  were  not  half  watched,  with  the 
result  that  they  were  the  happy  hunting-grounds  of  poachers  who, 
while  they  made  free  with  the  game,  and  perhaps  with  the  foxes, 
at  any  rate  so  disturbed  the  latter  that  they  were  seldom  in  covert 
when  wanted.  The  Curate,  however,  provided  a  good  fox;  Kinoul- 
ton  and  Hickling  were  soon  left  behind,  and  the  racing  pack  ran 
into  the  vale  ;  but  daylight  was  waning,  and  it  was  about  dusk 


SIR    RICHARD    SUTTON  237 

when  a  very  few  of  the  morning's  field  found  themselves  at 
Red  mile,  beyond  Belvoir  Castle.  Several  of  those  who  were 
up  at  the  finish  were  fifteen  or  seventeen  miles  from  home  ;  but 
the  general  verdict  was  that  no  one  would  have  grudged  a  journey 
of  a  hundred  miles  home  after  such  an  excellent  run. 

A  noted  horseman,  Captain  Campbell,  was  on  a  visit 
to  Beaumanor,  and  went  out  with  Sir  Richard  Sutton's 
hounds  as  often  as  possible.  Towards  the  close  of  De- 
cember 1852,  when  the  floods  were  out,  the  captain  had 
gone  to  some  fixture  on  the  eastern  side  of  the  country, 
and  had  not  arrived  at  his  host's  house  at  seven  o'clock, 
the  dinner-hour.  The  host,  anxious  for  the  welfare  of 
his  guest,  sent  a  groom  over  to  Ouorn  Hall  to  make 
inquiries.      The  master's  reply  was  :— 

I  can  give  a  good  account  of  the  fox,  but  as  to  accounting  for 
men,  especially  when  the  run  is  in  the  water  instead  of  on  land, 
it  is  quite  out  of  the  question.  However,  now  I  think  of  it,  I  did 
see  Campbell  plashing  down  the  Whissendine  Brook,  and  his 
horse  water-logged  in  mid-channel,  but  further  deponent  knoweth 
not,  for  the  hounds  were  in  full  cry ;  but  no  doubt  Campbell 
reached  the  shore  in  safety,  or  I  should  have  heard  of  it.  His 
dead  horse  I  saw  lying  on  the  bank  on  our  return.  Tell  the  ladies 
at  Beaumanor  to  play  "  The  Campbells  are  Coming,"  and  no 
doubt  he  will  soon  reach  the  Hall. 

Soon  after  eight  o'clock  the  captain  appeared  safe 
and  sound  at  Beaumanor.  The  rains  above,  however, 
and  the  floods  below,  never  once  deterred  the  master 
of  the  Quorn  from  keeping  his  fixture.  When  the 
meadows  and  roads  between  Barrow  and  Ouorn  were 
impassable,  the  Soar  was  crossed  at  Cotes,  the  van  con- 
veying the  pack,  his  carriage  Sir  Richard  and  the  Misses 
Sutton ;  old  Day  and  "  young-eyed  Day,"  the  whips, 
swam  the  torrent ;  while  the  carriage  doors  were  opened 
to  give  the  water  free  course  and  avoid  the  chance 
of  an  overturn. 

Quite  early  in  his  mastership,   Sir    Richard   Sutton 


238  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

announced  his  intention  of  hunting,  if  he  could,  six 
days  a  week,  and  this  intention  he  carried  out,  hunting 
the  Donington  as  well  as  the  Ouorn  country  ;  but  he 
presently  announced  that  he  would  hunt  eight  days  a 
week,  and  this  he  accomplished  by  handing  over  to 
his  son,  Mr.  Richard  Sutton,  the  Harborough  country, 
which  he  hunted  two  days  a  week,  he  himself  carrying 
the  horn,  and  having  Ben  Boothroyd  as  first  whipper-in.1 
It  was  just  about  the  time  when  Sir  Richard  delegated 
the  Harborough  country  to  his  eldest  son  Richard  that 
Mr.  Farnham,  member  of  Parliament  for  North  Leices- 
tershire, lost  his  horse  and  narrowly  escaped  a  very 
serious  accident.  Riding  a  valuable  hunter  over  an  old 
and  rickety  bridge  which  spanned  a  brook,  the  structure 
o-ave  way.  Mr.  Farnham  escaped  with  a  shaking,  but 
the  horse  broke  its  back,  and  was  shot. 

A  very  famous  run,  which  happily  involved  no  serious 
accident  to  man  or  horse,  came  off  on  the  21st  March 
1854.  The  ground  was  so  dry  that  a  small  number  only 
wended  their  way  to  Launde  Abbey. 

Tilton  Wood  was  drawn,  and  therefrom  a  stout  fox  went  away 
at  once  in  the  direction  of  Halstead,  running  to  the  left  of  Tilton 
village,  and  then  headed  straight  for  Skeffington  Hall,  leaving  that 
on  the  right;  and  making  his  way  through  the  Rolleston  planta- 
tions at  first,  headed  for  Alexton,  but  changing  his  mind  turned 
over  the  best  of  the  country  for  Shangton  Holt,  which  he  did  not 
enter.  At  a  pace  which  left  most  of  the  field  behind,  hounds 
skirted  Shangton  Holt,  ran  by  Illston-on-the-Hill  by  Newton 
Gorse,  the  nearest  man  to  them  being  Mr.  Lloyd  on  The  Felon, 
this  good  horse  carrying  his  rider  as  straight  as  an  arrow  by  Burton 
Abbey  and  on  to  Glenn  Gorse,  through  which  the  fox  ran,  and, 
passing  to  the  left  of  Westow  House,  went  on  to  Fleckney  and 
Counterthorpe,  but  only  to  double  and  bear  for  Shearsby  Inn, 
where  he  was  lost,  for  the  simple  reason  that  hounds  could  go  no 
further.    For  the  last  four  miles  their  huntsman,  like  every  one 


1  For   further   particulars    see    chapter   i.,    "  The   Quorn   Country  :    Its 
Hounds,  &c.,'  p.  3. 


SIR    RICHARD    SUTTON  239 

else,  was  nowhere  near  them,  and  as  in  a  former  run  the  fox  was  for 
some  time  on  one  side  of  the  fence  while  the  hounds  were  running 
hard  on  the  other,  and  the  pack  had  not  the  strength  to  get  either 
through  or  over  the  fence.  The  whole  distance  was  said  to  be 
twenty-five  miles,  and  the  time  an  hour  and  a  half.  Here,  there- 
fore, is  another  instance  of  the  absolute  untrustworthiness  of  either 
the  time  or  distance,  if  not  both,  of  some  of  the  other  runs  read 
about  in  comparatively  olden,  as  well  as  in  modern  times.  The 
first  flight,  such  as  it  was,  consisted  of  Mr.  Lloyd,  Mr.  Ainsworth, 
Mr.  Wood,  Mr.  Campbell,  Mr.  Heycock,  Captain  Hawksley,  the 
Hon.  H.  Coventry,  Lord  Gardner,  &c.  All  the  horses  were  com- 
pletely settled,  and  it  was  with  the  greatest  difficulty  that  the 
hounds  were  taken  to  Leicester,  where  a  special  train  was  char- 
tered, and  the  hounds,  horses,  and  some  of  the  field  were  carried 
along  the  Syston  and  Peterborough  line,  the  Meltonians  being 
dropped  en  route,  and  the  rest  taken  on  to  Oakham. 

In  the  year  1855  a  fillip  was  given  to  the  social  life 
of  Melton  Mowbray  by  a  lengthy  visit  of  the  Duchess 
of  Cambridge  and  the  Princess  Mary  (Duchess  of  Teck) 
to  the  Earl  and  Countess  of  Wilton  at  Egerton  Lodge  ; 
but  at  the  same  time  the  pleasure  of  hunting  men  was 
somewhat  marred  by  the  discovery  that  a  dog  fox  and  a 
brace  of  vixens  had  been  poisoned  in  Sir  Harry  Good- 
ricke's  Gorse.  The  two  vixens  were  buried,  but  the  doe 
was  sent  for  examination  to  Mr.  Brown,  the  noted 
veterinary  surgeon  of  Melton.  He  found  in  the  stomach 
of  the  fox,  which  weighed  16  lbs.,1  the  remains  of  a 
poisoned  "  crow"  ;  but  as  some  of  the  local  farmers  had 
taken  to  the  practice  of  setting  poison  for  rooks,  it  was 
thought,  after  due  consideration,  that  the  foxes  were 
killed,  not  by  poison  set  for  them,  but  because  they  had 
eaten  the  rooks  which  had  partaken  of  the  poisoned  food. 

Early  in  the  year  1855,  Sir  Richard  Sutton  had 
made  casual  mention  of  his  desire  to  resign  the  master- 

1  The  average  weight  of  a  dog  fox  is  about  13  lbs.  They  have  weighed 
as  little  as  1 1  lbs.  and  as  much  as  20  lbs.  ;  but  these  more  gigantic  speci- 
mens have  been  killed  in  the  Fell  countries.  Vixens  scale  about  2  lbs.  less 
than  dogs. 


24o  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

ship  of  the  Ouorn  Hunt,  a  position  which  had  entailed 
a  considerable  amount  of  anxiety,  but  his  friends  kept 
urging  him  to  remain  at  the  post  he  so  well  adorned. 
So  popular  was  he  that  in  the  year  1852  the  members 
of  the  Hunt  commissioned  Sir  Francis  (then  Mr.  F.) 
Grant  to  paint  Sir  Richard's  portrait,  which  he  did 
with  the  greatest  success,  the  picture  including  likenesses 
of  Tom  Day,  Ben  and  Jack  Morgan  the  whippers-in, 
and  also  the  Duke  of  Rutland,  the  Marquis  of  Granby, 
the  Hon.  Colonel  Lowther,  Mr.  Assheton  Smith,  Mr. 
Greene,  Mr.  H.  Heathcote,  Mr.  Banks  Wright,  Messrs. 
Frank,  Charles,  and  Richard  Sutton,  and  Mr.  John 
Wood. 

Just  about  this  time  it  was  noted  that  some  of  the 
best  horsewomen  in  England  were  hunting  in  Leicester- 
shire, ladies  who  could  and  did  go  perfectly  straight ;  but  it 
was  remarked  that  in  no  case  did  ladies  wear  spurs,  while 
a  further  item  of  gossip  was  that  Mr.  Rowland  Smith,  a 
member  of  an  unlucky  family,  had  sustained  a  somewhat 
severe  accident.  While  riding  a  hard  puller  near  Ashby- 
de-la-Zouch  his  horse  ran  him  against  a  tree  and  broke 
his  arm.  Only  a  few  days  before  Mr.  Smith's  brother, 
while  following  the  Hertfordshire  hounds,  met  with  a 
very  similar  mishap.  His  horse  bolted,  and  running 
against  a  tree,  severely  injured  his  rider's  knee-cap  ;  and 
to  make  the  story  complete,  the  father  of  the  two  sons, 
when  hunting  in  Hertfordshire,  sustained  a  fall  and  had 
his  shoulder  very  much  injured. 

A  rhymester,  too,  paid  his  tribute  to  the  excellence  of 

Sir  Richard's  rule,  one  of  the  verses  of  his  hunting  song 

being — 

Then  long  may  good  Sir  Richard  live  to  grace  his  honoured  name, 
And  long,  too,  may  his  gallant  sons  uphold  their  father's  fame ; 
And  distant  be  the  day  when  we  shall  see  him  quit  the  field, 
And  leave  to  hand  less  gracefully  the  hunter's  horn  to  wield. 
Then  join  with  me  right  heartily,  and  a  chorus  loud  we'll  chime 
For  this  fine  old  English  gentleman,  the  pride  of  modern  time. 


SIR    RICHARD    SUTTON  241 

The  good  wishes  contained  in  this  stanza  were,  it 
need  not  be  said,  heartily  re-echoed  by  all  the  followers 
of  Sir  Richard  Sutton's  hounds  ;  but  unhappily  the  time 
was  fast  drawing  near  when  the  popular  master  was  to  be 
cut  off  almost  in  the  prime  of  life,  at  the  comparatively 
early  age  of  fifty-seven.  His  hounds  had  enjoyed  many 
good  runs  ;  but  seeing  that  he  had  a  stud  of  about  eighty 
horses,  a  monster  pack  of  hounds,  and  paid  all  expenses 
himself,  he  came  to  the  conclusion  that  the  game  was 
not  worth  the  candle,  and  that,  owing  to  one  thing  and 
another,  the  average  sport  was  not  good  enough  to  war- 
rant his  expenditure.  On  this  account  it  was  that  he 
determined  to  resign  at  the  end  of  the  season  1855-56. 

The  end,  however,  came  before  that,  as  on  the  14th 
November  1855  the  hunting  world  of  Leicestershire  was 
greatly  shocked  at  learning  that  Sir  Richard  Sutton 
had  died  suddenly  at  his  London  residence,  Cambridge 
House,  Piccadilly.  On  the  previous  Monday  he  had 
gone  to  London  on  business.  On  Wednesday  he  rose 
in  his  usual  health,  ate  a  good  breakfast,  wrote  some 
letters,  and  was  shortly  afterwards  found  dead  in  the 
lavatory.  The  sad  news  of  Sir  Richard  Sutton's  de- 
cease reached  Ouorndon  Hall  soon  after  the  hounds  had 
started  for  Ratcliffe,1  and  a  mounted  messenger  being 
despatched,  the  hounds  were  of  course  recalled,  and  the 
utmost  sorrow  prevailed  in  Leicestershire.  Men  on 
arriving  at  the  fixture  would  scarcely  credit  the  news  ; 
but  it  proved  to  be  only  too  true. 

Sir  Richard  Sutton  came  of  a  good  old  family,  tracing 
back  to  the  Normans,  the  late  master  being  eighteenth 
in  descent  from  Richard  or  Roland  de  Sutton  (upon 
Trent),  who  is  mentioned  in  Thornton's  "Antiquities  of 
Nottingham,"  so  that,  although  Sir  Richard  was  not  a 
Leicestershire  man,  he  was  very  near  being  one.  Sir 
William  Sutton,  who  lived  in  the  time  of  Charles  I.,  was, 
1  See  note,  page  336. 

Q 


242  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

for  his  devoted  allegiance  to  his  sovereign,  raised  to 
the  peerage  as  Lord  Lexington;  but  the  title  became 
extinct,  though  it  is  by  no  means  certain  that  it  could 
not  have  been  successfully  claimed  by  later  members 
of  the  family.  Sir  Richard,  who  was  the  eldest  son  of 
Mr.  John  Sutton,  son  of  Sir  Richard  Sutton,  formerly 
Under-Secretary  of  State,  was  born  on  the  16th  Decem- 
ber 1798,  and  when  in  his  fourth  year  succeeded  to 
the  baronetcy,  on  the  death  of  his  grandfather,  the  first 
holder  of  the  title.  As  a  most  courteous  gentleman  and 
a  keen  all-round  sportsman  he  had  scarcely  any  equal. 
Possibly  Assheton  Smith  was  rather  the  bolder  horseman 
of  the  two,  and  both  had  their  fields  under  command  ; 
but  Sir  Richard  was  the  more  careful  man  ;  he  had  more 
consideration  for  his  horses  than  had  Mr.  Smith.  As  a 
shot,  Sir  Richard  Sutton  shone  supremely. 

General  Anson,  then  accounted  one  of  the  best  rabbit 
shots  of  the  day,  was  once  backed  against  Sir  Richard 
Sutton  for  a  day's  rabbit-shooting  at  Colonel  Peel's.  Sir 
Richard  arrived  rather  late — a  most  unusual  circumstance 
for  him,  who  was  the  essence  of  punctuality.  He  was 
informed  that  a  wa^er  had  been  made  as  to  his  score 
compared  with  that  of  Colonel  Anson,  but  he  merely 
replied,  "Never  mind;  I  shall  be  with  him  presently;" 
and  so  he  was,  as  before  three  o'clock  in  the  afternoon 
he  was  several  couples  to  the  good,  and  eventually  won. 

Like  many  another  good  sportsman,  Sir  Richard  had 
strong  likes  and  dislikes.  Differing  from  Mr.  Osbaldeston, 
he  could  not  endure  pigeon-shooting,  and  he  compared 
carrying  a  bird  to  a  trap  and  shooting  it  to  turning  a  stag 
out  of  a  cart ;  but  his  experience  of  stag-hunting  appears 
to  have  been  confined  to  an  unlucky  day  with  Mr.  Robert 
Hamond's  staghounds  when  he  was  down  in  Norfolk  for 
shooting.  The  hounds  met  on  the  confines  of  Swaffham 
Heath,  about  seven  miles  from  Lindford  ;  but  on  this  par- 
ticular occasion  the  stag,  by  his  "  cussedness,"  enabled 


SIR    RICHARD    SUTTON  243 

Sir  Richard,  who  was  no  admirer  of  staof-huntino-  at  the 
best  of  times,  to  turn  the  whole  matter  into  ridicule. 
When  the  deer  was  uncarted,  he  kept  trotting  up  and 
down  among  the  horses,  and  more  than  once  had  a  good 
stare  at  the  master  of  the  Burton  (Sir  Richard  Sutton 
was  hunting  that  country  at  the  time).  The  deer  would 
not  run,  so  was  put  back  in  his  cart,  Sir  Richard  Sutton's 
comment  being  that  it  was  better  than  Pzmck.  For 
several  years  he  rented  Mrs.  Farquharson's  moor  in 
Aberdeenshire,  and  often  killed  a  hundred  brace  of 
grouse  in  a  day,  while,  until  he  broke  his  thigh  in  the 
Burton  country,  he  achieved  no  little  fame  as  a  deer- 
stalker. On  coming  south  for  hunting,  he  shot  every 
day  on  which  hounds  were  not  out. 

It  speaks  well  for  Sir  Richard,  too,  that  all  his  hunt  servants 
were  so  much  attached  to  him.  When  he  took  over  the  Burton 
country  he  engaged  Jem  Shirley,  an  "  owdacious  man  with  a  big 
voice,"  and  Jem  Wilson,  who  had  formerly  lived  with  Mr.  Assheton 
Smith.  When  Sir  Richard  Sutton  broke  his  thigh,  as  already  men- 
tioned,1 and  there  was  some  chance  of  the  hounds  being  given  up, 
Shirley  was  told  that  he  would  have  to  go,  but  he  replied  that  he 
would  not;  and  when  informed  that  he  would  have  no  wages,  he 
promptly  answered  that  he  would  stop  without  any  pay. 

He  then  went  into  Norfolk  with  Sir  Richard,  where  he  lived 
in  the  house,  walked,  as  fast  as  his  increasing  waistcoat  would 
let  him,  with  the  gentlemen  out  shooting,  and  fancied  himself  a 
gamekeeper.  He  was  reinstated  in  his  berth  as  soon  as  his 
master  got  well  again,  and  Jem  Wilson  remained  on  as  whip. 

Sir  Richard  Sutton  dying  in  mid-season,  some 
arrangement  was  necessary  for  the  carrying  on  of  the 
Ouorn  Hunt  ;  and  for  this  purpose  his  two  sons,  Messrs. 
Richard  and  Frank  Sutton,  managed  affairs,  the  former 

1  This  is  said  to  have  happened  owing  to  the  fancy  Sir  Richard  had  for 
riding  bad  horses.  He  knew  this,  however,  and  would  ride  almost  anything 
that  would  jump.  The  horse  which  gave  him  this  fall  refused  several  times, 
and  then  went  crashing  through  the  fence,  fell  on  the  edge  of  the  ditch  on 
the  other  side,  with  his  rider's  thigh  underneath  him,  and  this  lamed  Sir 
Richard  Sutton  for  life. 


244  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

confining  himself  chiefly  to  the  Harborough  country, 
which  he  hunted  ;  but  on  his  father's  death  he  notified 
his  intention  of  giving  up  the  country.  Mr.  F.  Sutton, 
with  a  scratch  pack,  hunted  the  country  south  of  the 
Wreake,  occupying  the  Ouorn  kennels. 

Soon  after  Sir  Richard  Sutton's  death,  his  hounds 
and  horses  were  sold  by  Messrs.  Tattersall,  and  they 
realised  good  prices. 1 

At  the  conclusion  of  the  season  1855-56,  Mr.  Richard 
Sutton  disposed  of  his  pack  of  forty  couples,  besides 
sundry  young  hounds. 

Within  a  week  or  two  of  Sir  Richard  Sutton's 
death,  a  meeting  was  held  at  the  Bell  Hotel,  Leicester, 
to  consider  what  course  should  be  taken  to  secure  the 
hunting  of  the  Ouorn  country.  Lord  Berners,  who 
presided,  said  that  there  had  been  a  preliminary  gather- 
ing- at  Mr.  Farnham's  house,  and  it  was  then  agreed 
that  the  present  meeting  should  be  arranged.  He 
announced  that  no  one  had  come  forward  to  hunt  the 
country  north  of  the  Wreake  ;  but  that  for  the  remainder 
of  the  season  Mr.  Richard  Sutton  (Sir  Richard  after  his 
father's  death)  had  consented  to  hunt  three  days  a  week 
south  of  the  W7reake  for  whatever  subscriptions  could 
be  collected.  In  the  absence  of  any  offer  for  the  re- 
mainder of  the  country,  Lord  Berners  suggested  that 
a  communication  should  be  made  to  Lord  Forester, 
inquiring    whether    he    would    be    willing   to    hunt    the 

1  The  prices  were  :  five  couples,  Lord  Stamford,  59  guineas  ;  five  couples, 
Mr.  Drake,  52  guineas  ;  five  couples,  Mr.  Morrell,  210  guineas  ;  five  couples, 
Mr.  R.  Sutton,  200  guineas  ;  five  couples,  Lord  Stamford,  61  guineas  ;  five 
couples,  Lord  Stamford,  46  guineas  ;  five  couples,  Mr.  R.  Sutton,  100 
guineas  ;  five  couples,  Mr.  Mainwaring,  170  guineas  ;  five  couples,  Mr. 
Collier,  39  guineas  ;  five  couples,  Mr.  Mainwaring,  13  guineas  ;  five  couples, 
Mr.  R.  Sutton,  300  guineas  ;  five  couples,  Lord  Stamford,  74  guineas  ;  five 
couples,  Mr.  R.  Sutton,  260  guineas;  five  couples,  Mr.  Collier,  105  guineas. 
Total  for  the  hounds,  1806  guineas.  Thirty-two  hunters  realised  581c 
guineas,  and  the  others  about  400  guineas.  Six  cub-hunters  were  sold  for 
466  guineas  ;  three  hacks  for  242  guineas  ;  the  ponies  brought  1068  guineas  ; 
the  whole  total,  including  the  hound-van,  saddlery,  &c,  being  ^8664. 


SIR    RICHARD    SUTTON 


245 


country  north  of  the  Wreake  for  the  remainder  of  the 
season.  It  was  agreed  that  Mr.  Sutton's  offer  should 
be  accepted,  and  that  the  offer  should  be  made  to  Lord 
Forester.  Mr.  Dawson,  a  well-known  member  of  the 
Hunt,  did  not  like  the  idea  of  the  Donington  country 
being  left  open,  and  suggested  that  for  the  future  it 
should  be  separated  from  the  Ouorn,  as  it  was  very 
improbable  that  any  one  else  would  be  found  to  hunt 
the  Ouorn  country  as  the  late  master  had  hunted  it.  It 
was  then  agreed  that  a  letter,  similar  to  that  indited  to 
Lord  Forester,  should  be  forwarded  to  Lord  Chester- 
field, expressing  a  hope  that  he  might  see  his  way  to 
hunting  the  Donington  country.  During  the  remain- 
der of  the  season  the  Messrs.  Sutton  carried  on  the 
thread  of  fox-hunting,  and  amid  a  general  lamentation 
Sir  Richard's  Sutton's  rule  came  to  an  end  as  already 
described. 


m 


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Mm 


: 


CHAPTER    IX 

EARL    OF    STAMFORD    AND    WARRINGTON 

(1856-1863) 


247 


CHAPTER    IX 

EARL    OF   STAMFORD   AND   WARRINGTON 

1856-1863 

SIR  RICHARD  SUTTON  having  died  November 
1855,  and  the  negotiations  with  Lord  Forester, 
Lord  Chesterfield,  and  Sir  Richard  Sutton's  sons  having 
fallen  through,  it  became  necessary  to  lose  no  time  in 
looking  about  for  a  fresh  master,  especially  as  it  was  not 
considered  likely  that  a  second  Sir  Richard  Sutton  would 
be  easily  found.  The  Donington  country,  too,  was 
something  of  a  trouble,  as  it  was  literally  swarming 
with  foxes,  and  sundry  occupiers  of  land  were  heard  to 
declare  that  they  must  be  killed  somehow. 

At  this  juncture  the  Quorn  committee  determined 
to  approach  Lord  Stamford,  who  was  then  hunting  the 
Albrighton  country,  and  they  selected  as  their  plenipo- 
tentiary Mr.  John  Storey,  who  had  been  hunting  the 
Donington  country,  and  who  appears  to  have  been  a 
born  diplomatist.  By  rail  and  post-chaise  he  went 
straight  away  to  Enville  Hall,  where  he  learned  that 
the  noble  lord  of  whom  he  was  in  quest  was  out  shooting. 
Mr.  Storey,  with  the  interest  of  the  Ouorn  Hunt  at  his 
heart,  went  in  pursuit  of  the  shooters,  and  gained  courage 
when  he  learned  that  Lord  Strathmore,  whom  he  knew, 
was  one  of  the  party.  By  Lord  Strathmore  Mr.  Storey 
was  introduced  to  Lord  Stamford,  to  whom  he  was 
personally  unknown  ;  shooting  was  suspended,  and  the 

trio  returned  to  Enville  Hall.     Once  under  Lord  Stam- 

249 


250  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

ford's  hospitable  roof,  Mr.  Storey  lost  no  time  in  making 
his  mission  known.  "Well,  my  lord,"  he  said,  "  I  come 
with  full  powers  to  offer  you  the  first  hunting  country 
in  the  world.  Leicestershire  wants  a  master,  and  it  is 
determined,  with  your  permission,  to  have  Lord  Stam- 
ford." 

The  earl  replied  that  he  was  very  much  flattered  by 
the  offer  which  had  been  made  to  him,  and  that  it  was 
the  height  of  his  ambition  to  hunt  what  he  might  almost 
call  his  native  country  ;  but  that  he  could  not  cast  off 
the  Albrighton  "like  an  old  shoe."1 

No  man,  we  are  told,  is  as  good  as  his  principles, 
and  subsequently  Lord  Stamford  gave  in  to  Mr.  John 
Storey's  persuasive  eloquence  ;  he  did  give  up  the 
Albrighton,  and  when  Mr.  Storey  set  out  on  his  home- 
ward journey,  he  had  in  his  pocket  Lord  Stamford's 
written  promise  to  become  the  seventeenth  master  of 
the  Quorn,  that  is  to  say,  of  the  country  north  of  the 
Wreake,  Mr.  Sutton  having  the  country  south  of  that 
river.  It  was  further  understood  that  Lord  Stamford 
would  decline  all  subscriptions  save  in  the  shape  of  a 
covert  fund. 

Lord  and  Lady  Stamford  took  up  their  residence 
at  Bradgate  Park  ;  but  the  new  master  rented  the 
Quorn  stables  and  kennels  from  Mr.  E.  Warner  (of  the 
firm  of  Cartwright  &  Warner),  who  had  purchased  the 
Quorndon  Hall  estate  from  the  representatives  of  Sir 
Richard  Sutton  at  a  large  price,  exclusive  of  the  valuable 
furniture,  which  was  to  be  taken  at  a  valuation. 

George  Harry  Grey,  the  seventh  Earl  of  Stamford 
and  Warrington,  was  the  son  of  Lord  Grey  of  Groby, 
and  on  the  latter's  death,  the  son  was  but  ten  years  old 
on  succeeding  to  the  barony  ;  while  on  the  decease  of 

1  Another  story  is  that  Lord  Stamford  was  only  too  glad  to  shake  from 
his  feet  the  Albrighton  dust,  as  not  only  did  he  have  some  sort  of  dispute 
with  the  Hunt,  but  he  found  foxes  very  short. 


EARL    OF    STAMFORD  251 

his  grandfather  the  sixth  earl,  the  master  of  the  Quorn 
came  into  the  great  fortune  which  enabled  him  to  hunt 
the  country  in  such  magnificent  style.  Lord  Stamford 
was  educated  at  Eton  and  Cambridge — what  a  number 
of  masters  of  hounds  those  two  seats  of  learning  have 
turned  out — and  quite  in  his  early  years  he  showed  a 
remarkable  aptitude  for  all  athletic  exercises,  especially 
cricket ;  and  when  at  Cambridge  he  kept  his  horses  at 
Huntingdon,  the  packs  which  he  chiefly  followed  being 
the  Oakley  and  the  Fitz-William,  though  he  sometimes 
travelled  as  far  as  the  Quorn.  But  it  was  rarely  that 
he  went  out  with  Squire  Barnett  (then  master  of  the 
Cambridgeshire),  though  he  entertained  the  greatest 
respect  for  that  excellent  sportsman  ;  but  he  did  not 
deem  his  country  sufficiently  tempting.  As  a  master 
of  hounds  Lord  Stamford  began  with  the  Albrighton, 
which  country  he  hunted  for  a  season  or  two  from  1848, 
he  being  succeeded  by  the  Hon.  Arthur  Wrottesley  ; 
but  came  again  to  the  rescue  of  the  country  in  1855, 
giving  it  up  for  the  Quorn,  as  already  mentioned, 
in  1856. 

Lord  Stamford  bought  several  lots  of  hounds  at  the 
sales  of  Sir  Richard  and  Mr.  Sutton,  and  also  drew 
on  the  stock  of  Captain  Anstruther  Thomson  ;  but  in 
addition  he  bought  the  entire  Bedale  pack  from  Mr. 
Milbank,  and  also  Mr.  Shaw  Hellier's  hounds.1  When 
he  became  master  of  the  Quorn,  therefore,  he  had  about 
eighty  couples  of  good  hounds,  and  a  stud  of  something 
like  eighty-seven  hunters  and  hacks.  Ben  Boothroyd, 
who  had  been  with  Mr.  Storey  in  the  Donington  country, 
was  installed  in  the  huntsman's  berth,  Sam  Bacon  and 
James  Maiden  being  the  whippers-in. 

The  cub-hunting  season  was  successful  enough,  and 
late  in  October,  after  meeting  at  Thornton  Roughs,  the 
hounds  had  a  run  of  two  hours  and  forty  minutes.     On 

1  See  page  29. 


252  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

the  first  day  of  the  regular  season,  the  fixture  was 
changed  from  the  time-honoured  Kirby  Gate  to  Ash- 
fordby  ;  but  there  appears  to  have  been  some  misunder- 
standing as  to  the  opening  day,  as  not  a  few  hunting 
men  made  their  way  to  Kirby  Gate. 

Ashfordby,  by  the  way,  was  the  residence  of  two 
gentlemen  who  both  died  since  the  previous  season  had 
opened  at  Kirby  Gate,  one  of  them  a  few  days  only 
before  the  Ashfordby  fixture.  They  were  Mr.  John 
Dick  Burnaby  of  the  Hall,  and  the  Reverend  Andrew 
Burnaby,  the  rector.  The  latter  was  a  "character." 
He  at  one  time  kept  a  large  private  school  at  Louth, 
in  Lincolnshire,  and  enjoyed  great  fame  as  a  scholar. 
He  published,  in  addition  to  some  Latin  poems,  a  good 
many  in  English,  some  of  both  being  in  praise  of  the 
chase  ;  while  a  book  called  Horce  Scholastics  was  also 
from  his  pen.  In  due  course  the  rich  family  living  of 
Ashfordby  fell  vacant,  and  on  his  induction  thereto, 
he  shut  himself  up  in  the  big  rectory  house  without  a 
single  attendant,  and  lived  the  life  of  an  anchorite.  His 
benevolence,  however,  was  only  bounded  by  his  means, 
for  nearly  every  shilling  of  his  income  was  expended  in 
works  of  charity.  Possessed,  however,  of  strange  sport- 
ing instincts,  he  permitted  himself  the  luxury  of  a  horse 
and  a  gig,  and  whenever  the  hounds  were  anywhere  at 
hand  he  used  to  hunt  on  wheels — for  he  was  gouty  ;  but 
he  must  have  suffered  from  "poor  man's  gout" — and 
generally  contrived  to  see  a  good  deal  of  the  run  ;  while 
his  enthusiasm  was  as  great  as  that  of  the  best-mounted 
follower  of  Lord  Stamford's  hounds. 

In  the  early  weeks  of  1857  Ben  Boothroyd  had  a 
bad  fall,  so  in  his  absence  Lord  Stamford  carried  the 
horn  himself ;  and  on  his  first  day,  although  he  lost  his 
fox,  he  succeeded  in  having  a  good  run,  and  on  sub- 
sequent occasions  he  proved  conclusively  that  he  knew 
how  to  handle  hounds.     The  veteran  Mr.  Little  Gilmour 


EARL    OF    STAMFORD  253 

still  remained  faithful  in  his  allegiance  to  the  Ouorn 
pack,  and  in  following  them  during  the  season  he  broke 
his  collar-bone — not  the  first  accident  he  sustained  in  his 
prolonged  career  of  riding  over  Leicestershire. 

Ben  Boothroyd  hunted  the  hounds  for  one  season 
only  under  Lord  Stamford,  for  his  appointment  to  the 
post  of  huntsman  was  never  popular  in  Leicestershire. 
He  was  voted  slow  with  the  Donington,  and  a  man 
must  be  very  quick  who  attempts  to  hunt  the  Ouorn. 
His  place  was  taken  at  the  beginning  of  the  season 
1857-58  by  John  Treadwell,1  a  first-class  man  in  all 
departments,  and  so  long  as  the  horn  was  at  his  saddle- 
bow good  sport  was  enjoyed,  sometimes  even  against 
long  odds  ;  and  a  good  Midland  sportsman,  who  met  the 
Quorn  at  Great  Dalby  in  November  1857,  declared  that 
nothing  during  the  day  gave  him  greater  pleasure  than 
on  arriving  at  the  fixture  to  find  old  Tom  Day,  for- 
merly huntsman  to  the  Ouorn,  with  Goodall,  of  the 
Belvoir,  and  John  Treadwell  engaged  in  careful  criticism 
of  the  Quorn  pack.  "  It  was  indeed  a  famous  trio," 
he  wrote. 

At  this  time  Ferneley,  the  famous  painter  of  animals 
and  hunting  scenes — he  painted  the  picture  of  Assheton 
Smith  on  Ayston,  with  Dick  Burton  and  some  favourite 
hounds— was,  as  he  had  been  for  some  time,  settled 
down  in  Melton.  In  the  February  of  1857  he  was 
engaged   on  a  picture  representing  a  horse  show,   and 

1  John  Treadwell,  the  son  of  James  Treadwell,  Mr.  Farquharson's  hunts- 
man in  Dorsetshire,  began  his  hunting  career  in  Scotland  under  Mr.  Robert- 
son, whipping  in  to  his  uncle,  Charles  Treadwell,  who  subsequently  hunted 
the  Bramham  Moor  hounds.  His  next  place  was  with  Major  Stretton  in 
Monmouthshire,  and  a  year  or  two  afterwards  he  went  to  the  Hambledon, 
then  under  the  mastership  of  Mr.  Walter  Long,  with  whom  he  remained  for 
about  four  years  before  removing  to  the  Vine,  then  under  a  committee,  with 
Sir  Richard  Pycroft  as  field  master.  In  1847  he  took  service  under  Mr. 
Henley  Greaves,  first  in  the  Cottesmore,  then  in  the  Essex  country,  and  in 
1857  became  huntsman  of  the  Quorn.  On  Lord  Stamford  giving  up  the 
country  in  1863  he  rejoined  Mr.  Henley  Greaves  in  the  Old  Berks  country, 
which  he  hunted  until  his  resignation  in  1882.     He  died  in  March  1895. 


254  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

among  the  lookers-on  were  several  Leicestershire  celeb- 
rities ;  while  Idas  and  the  Prior,  brother  to  Alice  Haw- 
thorne, were  among  the  horses.  "  The  Squire "  on 
Assheton  jumping  a  gate,  Sir  Harry  Goodricke  on  Dr. 
Russell,  and  Mr.  Holyoake  on  Crossbow  were  prominent 
characters  in  one  hunting  picture,  while  in  another  Sir 
Harry  was  represented  on  foot,  while  Mountford  was 
holding  his  fox  aloft. 

"  And  what  a  fox  it  was,"  writes  a  critic  who  examined  the 
picture.  "  None  of  those  bullet-headed  animals,  which  town 
artists  will  persist  in  drawing  on  the  look-out  for  rabbits,  but  a 
regular  racing  greyhound,  with  a  true  Cream  Gorse  or  Billesdon 
Coplow  birthright." 

A  third  picture  was  "  A  Scurry."  It  was  a  very  long  canvas  of 
about  seven  feet,  representing  all  the  principal  Melton  men  going 
away.  Lord  Wilton  was  leading,  as  he  generally  did,  with  Mr. 
Little  Gilmour  in  close  attendance,  behind  these  being  Captain 
Lloyd,  Mr.  Coke,  and  a  hard-riding  Russian  merchant.1  Five 
were  represented  as  going  over  a  gate  and  a  hedge  at  one  time, 
amongst  them  being  the  then  Duke  of  Rutland,  who  was  followed 
by  Mr.  (afterwards  Sir  Francis)  Grant.  This  picture  was  to 
be  raffled  for.  In  the  following  year  (1858),  when  Ferneley  was 
close  upon  eighty  years  of  age,  he  was  hard  at  work  upon  a 
sketch  of  the  Quorn  hounds  crossing  the  Nottingham  turnpike 
road  en  route  from  Melton  Spinney  to  Sir  Harry  Goodricke's 
Gorse  ;  while  one  of  his  largest  works  was  the  meet  of  the  Quorn 
under  Assheton  Smith  at  Shangton  Holt,  with  Lord  Plymouth 
and  other  well  -  known  Meltonians  of  Assheton  Smith's  time 
(1806-17).  Full  of  years,  and  by  no  means  without  honours, 
Mr.  John  E.  Ferneley  passed  away  at  Melton  on  the  4th  June 
i860.  His  father  had  been  a  wheelwright  at  Thrussington,  and 
tried  to  bring  up  his  son  to  his  trade,  but  the  son  had  other 
aspirations.2 


1  In  the  early  eighties,  a  Russian  merchant,  Mr.  Matvief,  was  a  regular 
follower  of  the  Surrey  staghounds,  and  sometimes  of  the  Burstow.  He  did 
not  begin  to  ride  until  late  in  life,  but  he  went  well,  and  the  writer  saw  him 
once  jump  a  very  awkward  gate  in  a  corner. 

*  For  a  detailed  notice  of  Ferneley,  see  Sir  Walter  Gilbey's  article  in 
Baity  s  Magazine  for  September  1897. 


EARL    OF    STAMFORD  255 

On  Saturday,  27th  September,  Ferneley's  paintings  and  sketches 
were  disposed  of  on  the  late  owner's  premises.  The  catalogue 
contained  eighty  lots,  consisting  of  sketches  of  hunting,  shooting, 
deerstalking,  &c. ;  portraits  of  Bay  Middleton,  Riddlesworth, 
Rowton,  Attila,  &c. ;  portraits  of  famous  jockeys,  and  numerous 
sketches  in  oils  made  for  Mr.  Osbaldeston. 

In  September  1857  Lord  Stamford  lost  a  horse  in 
a  somewhat  curious  manner.  Treadwell,  the  huntsman, 
was  one  day  riding  it  out  at  exercise  with  the  hounds, 
when  a  violent  thunderstorm  came  on.  The  horse, 
which  was  much  frightened,  became  very  ill,  so  Tread- 
well  dismounted  and  bled  it ;  but,  as  it  became  worse 
instead  of  better,  it  was  left  at  the  roadside  in  charge  of 
one  of  the  whippers-in,  and  there  it  died  before  a  veteri- 
nary surgeon  could  arrive.  The  death  was  attributed 
to  palpitation  of  the  heart,  induced  by  the  fright  at  the 
thunder  and  liorhtninQf. 

At  the  opening  of  the  season  1857-58  Melton  was 
tolerably  full,  as  early  in  November  the  principal  studs 
were — Lord  Wilton,  23  ;  Mr.  Coventry,  20  ;  Mr.  Lester, 
13;  Mr.  Read,  13;  Sir  George  Wombwell,  a  dozen; 
besides  many  others  which  did  not  reach  double  figures. 
"  As  many  horses  as  they  have  at  Newmarket,"  as  an 
enthusiastic  sportsman  wrote. 

As  had  been  the  case  with  Sir  Richard  Sutton  and 
other  popular  masters,  the  course  of  hunting  did  not 
run  quite  smoothly  with  Lord  Stamford,  as  we  find  him 
being  warned  off  by  a  Mr.  Allen,  though  the  details 
are  somewhat  shrouded  in  obscurity.  It  seems,  how- 
ever, that  the  tenant,  whoever  his  landlord  might  be, 
had  raised  some  question  in  connection  with  unexhausted 
improvements  ;  but  as  his  term  had  yet  six  months  more 
to  run,  it  was  rather  premature  to  ask  other  farmers  to 
subscribe  to  enforcing  compensation.  It  would  have 
been  quite  soon  enough  to  agitate  when  compensation 
was  refused. 


256  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

Most  racing  people  have  heard  of  old  Mr.  Richards, 
who  in  early  life  (he  was  born  at  Barbers'  Mill,  near 
Nottingham,  in  1776)  worked  at  the  stocking-frame. 
He  was  one  of  the  earl's  chosen  bookmakers,  and  was 
first  attracted  to  betting  by  winning  a  small  sum  on  a 
horse-race.  Richards  was  a  Leicestershire  man.  The 
story  goes  that  when  resting  at  a  village  inn,  while  hawk- 
ing stockings,  he  was  induced  to  play  at  cards,  rising 
the  winner  of  a  small  sum,  with  which  he  next  day 
backed  a  horse,  with  the  result  already  mentioned.  He 
soon  attended  Doncaster  and  Newmarket ;  and  as  the 
Meltonians,  a  good  many  of  them  at  least,  were  much 
addicted  to  betting,  Richards  drove  a  very  good  business 
in  laying  them  the  odds  to  any  extent.  He  was  a  curious 
combination,  for,  in  addition  to  being  wrapped  up  in 
racing,  he  studied  standard  works  as  seriously  as  though 
he  were  about  to  undergo  an  examination  in  them.  He 
declared  that  he  would  never  keep  a  servant  until  he 
was  worth  ^500  a  year.  He  kept  his  word,  and  in  due 
course  became  so  rich  that  he  took  Ragdale  Hall,  the 
beautiful  residence  of  the  seventh  Earl  Ferrers,  and  it 
was  said  that  one  of  his  motives  in  renting  the  mansion 
was,  that  he  should  be  better  in  touch  with  the  Mel- 
tonians than  he  could  be  in  his  native  village.  He  died  a 
wealthy  man  ;  left  three  sons  in  affluent  circumstances  ; 
while  his  daughter  became  the  wife  of  a  clergyman,  who 
was  afterwards  incumbent  of  the  parish  adjoining  Rag- 
dale.  Richards  is  mentioned  here  because  he  was  a 
supporter  of  the  Quorn  Hunt ;  and  though  never  a  hard 
rider,  he  used,  when  he  had  risen  to  comparatively 
good  circumstances,  to  meet  hounds  as  often  as  possible. 
He  died  in  November  1856,  when  about  eighty  years 
of  age. 

Most  of  the  runs  which  took  place  during  the  begin- 
ning of  the  season  1857-58  were  noted  rather  for  pace 
than  for  length,  brilliant  bursts  being  the  rule. 


EARL    OF    STAMFORD  257 

In  a  sharp  run  from  Baggrave  Spinney  to  Whetstone,  Lord 
Wilton,  who  was  riding  well  to  the  fore  as  usual,  had  an  ugly 
fall,  which  caused  serious  injury  to  his  thigh  ;  but  no  bones  being 
broken,  he  was  in  the  saddle  again  in  a  few  weeks ;  and  in  a  run 
which  took  place  on  the  4th  December  from  Parson's  Gorse  in  the 
Widmerpool  country,  Treadwell's  bold  riding  was  much  approved, 
as  for  the  forty-five  minutes  during  which  the  run  lasted  he  was 
always  in  the  same  field  with  his  hounds,  and  was  close  to  them 
to  pick  up  his  fox  when  they  rolled  him  over.  On  Friday  Decem- 
ber 1 8th,  and  Saturday,  December  19th,  Lord  Stamford's  hounds 
enjoyed  some  very  quick  runs ;  and  on  the  latter  day  Mr.  Little 
Gilmour  had  a  bad  fall  through  some  one  crossing  him  at  a  fence, 
that  being  the  third  he  had  had  during  the  season  from  the 
same  cause. 

The  year  1858  opened  with  a  good  run  or  two,  but 
on  the  whole  the  season  1857-58  was  voted  a  bad  one. 
On  January  1 1  the  hounds  found  one  fox  only,  but  they 
simply  raced  him  for  about  five-and-twenty  minutes.  On 
that  day  Treadwell  was  riding  a  horse  of  Lady  Stamford's, 
his  orders  being-  to  stop  at  no  fence  whatever  ;  and  so 
well  did  Treadwell  obey  his  instructions  that  he  pounded 
even  Lord  Gardner,  not  to  mention  others,  at  a  flight  of 
double  posts  and  rails.  Lady  Stamford  was  a  fine  and 
bold  horsewoman,  and  in  1859  a  paragraph  was  published 
in  some  of  the  newspapers  which  purported  to  be  a 
challenge  from  Lady  Stamford  to  any  other  lady  to  ride 
across  country  for  ^"500  a  side.  This  piece  of  absurdity 
Lord  Stamford  at  once  contradicted  in  the  press. 

There  may  possibly  be  some  who  hunted  from  Melton 
in  the  fifties  who  remember  Mary  Anne  Hinman,  known 
as  the  "  Female  Blacksmith."  Of  her  own  free  will  she 
elected  to  follow  her  father's  trade,  and  while  she  assisted 
generally  in  the  business,  she  was  greatly  in  request  for 
shoeing,  in  which  art  she  was  an  adept  ;  and  it  is  said 
that  she  shod  half  the  best  hunters  in  Melton.  After  a 
short  illness  she  died,  early  in  April  1858,  and  was 
buried    in    Melton   churchyard,   where    can    be    seen   (or 


258  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

could  be  seen)  a  gravestone  to  a  male  blacksmith,  with 
the  following  epitaph  : — 

My  sledge  and  hammer  lie  reclined, 
My  bellows,  too,  have  lost  their  wind  ; 
My  fire's  extinguished — forge  decayed, 
And  in  the  dust  my  vice  is  laid  ; 
My  coal  is  spent,  my  iron  gone ; 
The  last  nail's  drove,  and  work  is  done. 

If  the  season  1857-58  was  not  a  particularly  good 
one,  there  were  at  any  rate  some  good  runs  in  that  which 
followed.  On  the  18th  December  1858,  Lord  Stamford's 
hounds  had  a  somewhat  remarkable  hunt  of  four  hours 
and  ten  minutes. 

They  met  at  Bardon  Hill,  and  no  sooner  were  hounds  in  covert 
than  a  fox  jumped  up  in  view.  He  ran  a  fast  ring  round  the 
covert,  and  then  went  away  in  the  direction  of  Greenhill,  pointing 
for  the  monastery.  So  quickly  did  he  go  away  from  the  covert 
that  many  of  the  field  did  not  have  a  good  start.  He  soon  turned 
to  the  right  over  some  rough  ground,  skirted  Gisborne's  Gorse, 
left  the  Oaks  on  his  right,  and  made  his  way  to  Garendon  Park. 
There  he  was  unluckily  headed,  so  turned  short  to  the  right  up 
to  the  privets,  and  turning  equally  short  to  the  left,  passed  Whittle 
Hill  and  Chartley  Knoll  on  the  right,  and  running  through  Chartley 
Wood,  reached  the  racks,  where  the  fox  turned  to  the  right  and 
this  time  ran  through  Gisborne's  Gorse,  and  thence  straight  back 
to  Bardon  Hill,  the  return  journey  allowing  many  of  those  thrown 
out  to  nick  in.  Round  Bardon  Hill  the  fox  ran  a  couple  of  rings 
and  then  he  made  for  Green  Hill,  running  the  road  for  a  distance  ; 
but,  on  being  headed,  made  his  way  back  again  to  Bardon  Hill, 
around  which  he  travelled  once  ;  then  went  off  for  the  monastery, 
but  turning  to  the  left  through  Holly  Knoll  Wood,  very  nearly  up  to 
Coleville ;  again  bent  to  the  left,  leaving  Bardon  Station  and  the 
railway  on  the  right,  returning  thence  to  his  old  quarters  at  Bardon 
Hill,  where,  thoroughly  exhausted,  he  was  run  into  ;  the  pace 
having  been  very  good  considering  that  the  run  lasted  four  hours 
and  ten  minutes  with  no  check  to  speak  of. 

Only  a  few  days  later  (23rd  December  1858)  the  hounds  met 
at  Barrow  Lodge,  where  foxes  were  so  carefully  tended  by  Mr. 
Shield.      Finding  in  a  covert  near  at  hand,  away  went  the  fox  as 


EARL    OF    STAMFORD  259 

hard  as  he  could  race  to  Grace  Dieu,  and  after  running  by  Belton 
village  the  fox  was  headed,  and  so  ran  along  the  brook  for  about 
a  mile,  over  the  road  as  if  for  Breedon  Clouds,  and  then  to  the 
right  as  if  for  Donington  Park,  which  place  he  reached  after 
several  turns.  The  time  to  that  point  was  an  hour  and  twenty 
minutes.  There  had  been  no  previous  check,  but  one  occurred 
then.  Presently  Treadwell  hit  off  the  line,  and  eventually  the 
hounds  ran  into  their  fox  in  Mr.  Storey's  stack-yard  at  Lockington 
village,  after  a  hunt  of  two  hours  and  twenty  minutes  from  the 
start.  Then  on  the  30th  December  the  hounds  met  at  Doning- 
ton Park.  Among  those  out  were  Lord  Stanhope,  Mr.  Storey, 
Mr.  Phillips,  and  Lord  Stamford.  The  last-named  is  especially 
mentioned  because  it  would  appear  that  he  was  very  seldom  seen 
in  the  hunting  field  about  this  period,  which  is  rather  curious, 
seeing  that  he  had  been  master  of  hounds  before,  and  hunted  the 
country  at  his  own  cost,  save  for  the  covert  fund.  On  this 
occasion  hounds  ran  for  upwards  of  two  hours  and  a  half.  Lord 
Stamford  did  not  see  the  finish  of  the  run,  for  he  rode  his  third 
horse  to  a  standstill  in  Robin  Wood.  At  the  invitation  of  Lord 
Stanhope,  Treadwell,  the  whippers-in,  and  the  hounds  remained 
for  the  night  at  Bretby. 

The  records  of  the  season  1858-59  were  that  with  71 
couples  of  hounds  Lord  Stamford  hunted  136  days  (no 
blank  days),  killed  15  brace  of  cubs,  23!  brace  of  foxes, 
and  ran  2,7  brace  to  ground. 

Almost  from  the  very  first  there  appears  to  have 
been  a  kind  of  misunderstanding  between  Lord  Stamford 
and  some  people  in  the  country,  and  during  the  season 
1858-59  there  was  a  rumour,  which  certainly  appears  to 
have  been  to  a  certain  extent  well  founded,  that  Lord 
Stamford  would  give  up  the  country  ;  then  he  agreed  to 
continue  in  office,  and  so  the  country's  mind  was  set  at 
ease  again.  Another  rumour  was  that  the  Old  Club, 
which  had  been  unoccupied  for  a  short  time,  would  be 
taken  by  Sir  George  Wombwell  and  some  of  his  friends, 
an  arrangement  which  does  not  appear  to  have  been 
carried  out. 

The  year   1859   saw  the  death  of  two  men  who  in 


260  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

their  time  played  a  prominent  part  in  the  history  of  the 
chase — within  a  twelvemonth  the  fifth  Earl  of  Jersey 
and  the  Marquis  of  Waterford  joined  the  great  majority. 
Mention  has  already  been  made  of  Lord  Jersey,  who 
was  a  notability  both  in  the  hunting  field  and  on  the 
turf.  Time  had  been  when  the  Marquis  of  Waterford 
was  as  well  known  at  Melton  as  any  one  who  ever  made 
the  place  his  hunting  headquarters.  Clothed  in  his  blue 
jacket  and  black  cap,  and  mounted  on  Yellow  Dwarf,  he 
was  a  prominent  figure  at  the  first  few  steeplechases  held 
in  the  vale  of  Aylesbury.  According  to  all  accounts  he 
rode  "anyhow,"  and  except  there  was  some  indication 
of  the  line  to  be  taken,  his  idea  of  steeplechase  riding 
appeared  to  be  to  jump  over  as  many  fences  as  possible. 
Once,  when  he  was  riding  in  a  steeplechase  at  Dunchurch 
against  Dick  Christian,  he  went  so  wide  at  a  turning-flag 
to  get  a  run  at  a  tempting-looking  fence  that  Dick  called 
out,  "My  lord!  where  are  you  going  to?"  He  was 
then  riding  Columbine.  How  he  put  the  Melton  toll- 
bar  into  the  not  altogether  appropriate  scarlet,  how  he 
aniseeded  the  heels  of  a  clergyman's  horse  and  then 
hunted  him  home  with  bloodhounds,  are  stories  which 
have  been  told  over  and  over  again.  Then,  in  con- 
sequence of  a  practical  joke  on  a  Norwegian  peasant- 
girl,  the  marquis  was  so  much  knocked  about  by  the 
Norwegian  watchmen  that  he  had  to  wear  a  wig  for 
some  time,  and  in  a  fast  run  with  the  Ouorn  from  Bur- 
rough  Hill  he  lost  this  same  headpiece.  The  marquis 
was  a  great  ally  of  deaf  Burke,  by  whom  he  was  taught 
boxing.  He  won  three  four-mile  steeplechases  in  one 
day  at  Eglinton  Park,  entered  heart  and  soul  into  the 
tournament,  and  did  many  other  things  which  amused 
England  at  the  time.  For  the  last  seventeen  years  or 
so  of  his  life  he  lived  at  home  in  Ireland,  where  he  kept 
the  Curraghmore  hounds,  which  were  a  capital  hunting- 
pack,   if  not  very  much  to  look  at.      He  and  his  men, 


EARL    OF    STAMFORD  261 

however,  were  wonderfully  well  mounted,  and  they  had 
plenty  of  horses  apiece,  so  that  his  great  sales  came  to 
be  regarded  as  an  annual  function.  He  seldom  ran  a 
horse  in  England  unless  he  had  something  he  deemed 
good  enough  to  have  a  chance  for  a  great  race,  but 
on  the  Irish  turf  he  was  a  prominent  character.  The 
Marquis  of  Waterford  met  his  death  out  hunting 
in  March  1859.  According  to  some  accounts  he  was 
riding  his  best  horse  ;  according  to  others  he  was  on  a 
middling  hunter.  At  any  rate,  the  fence  which  proved 
fatal  to  him  was  a  very  small  one  into  a  road.  The 
horse  made  a  mistake  at  it,  and  the  marquis  came  with 
such  violence  to  the  ground  that  he  broke  his  neck.  He 
was  wearing  a  hunting  cap  at  the  time,  and  it  was  said 
that  this  stiff  headgear  saved  his  head  at  the  expense  of 
his  neck  ;  and  the  story  goes  that  this  doctrine  had  a 
good  deal  to  do  with  sending  caps  out  of  fashion,  just  as 
black  satin  ceased  to  be  worn  after  Mrs.  Manning  elected 
to  wear  that  material  at  her  execution. 

The  latter  end  of  1859  saw  the  publication  of  an 
engraving  (by  Hacker)  of  Dick  Christian  mounted  on 
Mr.  Little  Gilmour's  Lord  Grey,  which  was  lent  to  Dick 
in  order  that  he  might  sit  to  the  artist.  No  sooner  was 
the  engraving  published  and  Lord  Grey  talked  about 
than  several  people  claimed  to  have  bred  him  ;  indeed, 
like  two  distinguished  persons  of  our  own  time,  he 
appears  to  have  had  several  birthplaces.  As  Dick 
Christian  himself  observed,  Lord  Grey,  like  his  master, 
was  very  bad  to  beat  over  Leicestershire.  Whatever 
may  be  the  history  of  his  breeding,  the  story  of  his 
later  years  appears  to  be  plain  enough.  Mr.  Garratt,  of 
Knossinaton,  bought  him  out  of  a  drove  at  Harborouodi 
— a  fact  which  would  have  entitled  him  to  be  described 
in  a  horse-show  catalogue  as  "  breeder  unknown."  Mr. 
Garratt  "played  with  him  for  a  season,"  and  then  sold 
him  to  Mr.  Gattring  of  Orton,  near  Newark,  from  whom 


262  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

he  passed  into  the  hands  of  Mr.  Hunter  of  Thorpe 
Arnolds.  One  day  Mr.  Gilmour  did  not  like  the  brown 
horse  which  had  been  sent  on  to  Six  Hills  for  his  riding, 
and  seeing  the  grey,  he  asked  to  get  on  him,  and,  having 
had  a  ride,  liked  him  so  much  that  he  bought  him  for,  it 
is  said,  ^170;  "  the  pair,"  as  Dick  Christian  remarked, 
"  have  never  been  out  of  flying  things  since  I've  known 
'em."  Dick  was  at  that  time  rising  eighty-one,  and  had 
nothing  to  depend  upon  except  the  kindness  of  his 
friends  ;  and  the  picture  appears  to  have  been  brought 
out  in  order  that  the  old  man  might  reap  some  advantage 
from  the  sale  thereof. 

The  year  1 860  opened  with  a  piece  of  good  news  for 
Leicestershire  fox-hunters.  The  antipathy  to  fox-hunt- 
ing of  the  late  Lord  Harborough  was  well  known,  and 
whenever  hounds  found  themselves  on  the  outskirts  of 
Stapleford  Park,  they  had  to  be  whipped  off.  Lord 
Harborough's  coverts  were  swarming  with  game,  which 
of  late  years  he  never  shot  himself,  and  his  plantations 
were  defended  by  quite  a  ckevazcx  de  /rise  of  dog-spears, 
which  would  have  sufficed  to  destroy  a  whole  pack,  had 
they  entered  the  coverts.  Soon  after  Lord  Harborough's 
death,  Lady  Harborough  earned  the  gratitude  of  Leices- 
tershire hunting  men  by  abolishing  the  dog-spears  and 
throwing  open  Stapleford  and  its  coverts  to  any  hounds 
which  might  run  thither. 

Since  November  1859  scent  had  been  catchy,  and 
with  the  exception  of  a  few  short  and  sharp  runs,  not 
very  much  sport  had  been  enjoyed;  but  on  the  27th 
January  i860  hounds  ran  for  two  hours  and  killed;  while 
a  little  later  Mr.  Bullen  of  Eastwell,  a  fine  specimen  of  a 
sporting  parson,  when  riding  in  a  foremost  position  in  a 
run  from  Six  Hills,  sustained  a  bad  fall  and  broke  his 
collar-bone. 

The  chief  residents  in  and  around  Melton  determined 
at  once  to  make  social  life  as  pleasurable  as  possible,  and 


EARL    OF    STAMFORD  263 

also  to  benefit  the  local  charities  as  some  acknowledg- 
ment of  favours  received  from  the  farmers.  So  far  as 
can  be  discovered,  the  month  of  March  i860  saw  the 
inauguration  of  the  first  amateur  theatricals  in  Melton, 
and  they  were  continued  for  several  years.  In  the  last 
week  in  March  there  took  place  in  the  Corn  Exchange 
an  "essentially  sporting  entertainment  provided  for  and 
by  the  lovers  of  the  chase." 

With  a  view  to  increase  the  funds  of  the  local  charities,  the 
Hon.  Seymour  Egerton,  himself  an  accomplished  musician,1  had 
at  his  resource  the  best  talent.  Mr.  Clarke,  stage  manager  at 
Windsor,  had  the  management  of  the  theatricals,  while  the 
scenery,  decorations,  &c,  were  produced  under  his  directions  by 
native  talent.  Lord  and  Lady  Grey  de  Wilton,  Mr.  and  Lady 
Mary  Craven,  the  Ladies  Catherine  and  Alice  Egerton,  Mr.  E.  B. 
Hartopp,  M.P.,  Captain  Hartopp,  and  Mr.  Evans  Hartopp  were 
the  principal  performers.  The  prologue,  written  by  Captain 
Hartopp  and  spoken  by  Lord  Grey  de  Wilton,  is  so  good  that  no 
apology  is  needed  for  its  reproduction  here. 

"  Kind  auditors,  bear  with  me  while  I  say 
A  few  words  on  the  subject  of  our  play. 
In  metaphoric  strain,  'tis  known  full  well 
By  all  who  in  this  sporting  country  dwell, 
How  oftentimes,  when  riding  at  a  brook, 
Upon  the  ghastly  chasm  as  you  look, 
Whose  banks  are  rotten,  and  whose  waters  deep 
(Although  you  quail  not  at  the  desperate  leap), 
This  anxious  thought  will  rise  your  breast  within, 
'  I  may  get  over — but  I  may  get  in,' 
Such  are  our  feelings,  coming  within  sight 
Of  such  an  audience  as  is  here  to-night. 
This  night's  performance  is  the  brook  we  near — 
Our  own  deficiencies  the  fall  we  fear  ; 
Success  the  banks,  towards  which  our  efforts  tend  ; 
Failure  the  waters  that  our  hopes  may  end. 
So  ere  we  leap,  we  earnestly  appeal 
To  you  bystanders,  hoping  that  you'll  feel 


1  He  was  at  the  head  of  the  Wandering  Minstrels,  a  society  which  often 
delighted  London  audiences. 


264  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

Some  pity  for  our  fate,  if  we  fall  short, 
Failing  to  reach  the  eminence  we  sought. 
Then,  if  we  falter  as  we  near  the  brink, 
Let  friendly  hands  support  us,  or  we  sink, 
Let  friendly  cheers  our  energies  sustain, 
And  if  we  flounder,  help  us  out  again. 
Then  by  your  aid  '  Still  Waters '  we'll  get  through, 
Our  '  Dreams  then  of  the  Future '  be  of  you, 
For  you  shall  '  Pillicoddy '  play  his  pranks, 
While  '  Betsy  Baker '  tenders  you  her  thanks. 
Strong  with  knowledge  that  we've  friends  at  hand, 
Boldly  we'll  leap— and  safely  we  shall  land." 

The  applause  was  great  when  Lord  Grey  de  Wilton  retired, 
and  then  came  the  overture.  "Still  Waters  Run  Deep"  and 
"Betsy  Baker"  were  the  pieces  played,  while  the  music  included 
a  violin  solo  by  the  Hon.  Seymour  Egerton  and  a  cornet  solo  by 
Mr.  A.  B.  Mitford.  On  the  following  evening  (Thursday)  the 
programme  included  "  A  Dream  of  the  Future  "  and  "  Poor  Pilli- 
coddy," while  the  instrumental  soloists  were  the  Hon.  Catherine 
Egerton  (pianoforte),  Mr.  Robley  (violoncello),  and  Mr.  Le  Patourel 
(flute).  In  "The  Dream  of  the  Future"  a  sporting  turn  was 
given  to  the  proceedings  by  the  introduction  of  the  names,  in 
connection  with  the  evening  party  in  the  play,  of  Dr.  Scraptoft, 
Lord  Ranksboro',  Mr.  Thrussington  Gorse,  Sir  Bescoby  and  Lady 
Oaks,  Mr.  B.  Coplow,  and  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Tilton  Wood.  Lord 
Grey  de  Wilton,  Lord  Gerald  Fitzgerald,  and  Hon.  H.  Coke  were 
among  those  who  were  members  of  the  orchestra;  the  musical 
programme  included  Mendelssohn's  Symphony  in  A  minor  and 
Concerto  in  G  minor,  overtures  to  "Zanetta,"  "William  Tell," 
aud  "  Oberon,"  while  the  incidental  music  was  composed  by  the 
Hon.  Seymour  Egerton.  Amongst  those  present  were  the  Duke 
of  Rutland,  Lord  and  Lady  Forester,  Hon.  G.  Fitzwilliam,  Earl 
and  Countess  of  Westmorland,  Countess  of  Sefton  and  the  Ladies 
Molyneaux,  Lord  Stanhope,  the  Hon.  Mrs.  Villiers,  Lady  Hamp- 
ton, Sir  Henry  Edwards,  Sir  Frederick  and  Lady  Fowke,  Countess 
of  Craven,  Marquis  of  Hartingdon,  Countess  of  Chesterfield,  Sir 
Walter  and  Lady  Carew,  Lord  and  Lady  Newport,  Lord  and  Lady 
Colville,  Lady  E.  Stanhope,  Lady  Wallace,  Hon.  F.  Morgan, 
Captain  Morgan,  Mr.  Cheeney  (High  Sheriff),  &c. 

In  the  following  year  (1861)  there  were  more  private 
theatricals,  but  the  festival  extended  to  three  days  instead  of 
two.     "A  Sheep  in  Wolf's  Clothing,"  "The  Mummy,"  and  "The 


EARL    OF    STAMFORD  265 

Critic  "  were  played  on  the  first  night ;  there  was  a  promenade 
concert  on  the  second  day ;  while  "Prison  and  Palace,"  "  Shocking 
Events,"  and  "Whitebait  at  Greenwich"  were  in  the  bill  for  the 
concluding  day;  and  in  the  last  act  of  the  first  piece  Lady 
Catherine  Egerton  appeared  on  the  stage  on  horseback  in  the 
character  of  the  Empress  of  Russia.  On  each  day  of  these  enter- 
tainments hounds  hunted,  the  fields  were  large  by  reason  of  the 
number  of  visitors  staying  in  and  around  Melton,  and  the  festival 
week  wound  up  with  a  very  good  performance  of  the  Messiah  ! 

To  return,  however,  to  hunting,  Count  Batthyany, 
after  being  an  absentee  for  several  years,  reappeared  at 
Melton  and  lost  no  time  in  building  a  Turkish  bath 
(erected  under  the  supervision  of  Mr.  Johnson,  architect, 
of  Melton  Mowbray)  as  an  aid  to  conditioning  his  horses. 
By-and-by  he  succeeded  to  the  title  of  Prince,  and  died 
at  Newmarket  towards  the  close  of  April  1883.  Like 
most  of  his  countrymen,  Prince  Batthyany  was  greatly 
attached  to  horses  and  field  sports  generally  ;  and  when 
he  first  joined  the  Melton  contingent  he  set  himself  the 
task  of  emulating  the  feats  of  the  Marquis  of  Waterford, 
Lord  Macdonald,  Colonel  Charetie,  Squire  Osbaldeston, 
Mr.  Powell,  and  other  first  flight  men.  He  rode  boldly 
and  well,  but  was  unable  to  beat  those  just  mentioned, 
though  he  always  took  a  good  place.  Of  his  riding  on 
the  turf  a  good  deal  might  be  said,  but  that  would  be  to 
branch  out  too  far. 

The  month  of  April  i860  saw  the  decease  of  the 
wealthy  Mr.  Lyne  Stephens,  formerly  a  well-known 
Meltonian.  He  was  said  to  be  the  richest  commoner 
in  England,  and  when  he  hunted  from  Melton,  from 
about  1832  to  1836,  his  stud  was  second  to  none,  for  no 
price  ever  stopped  him.  From  all  accounts,  however, 
he  was  a  wretched  horseman,  and  could  never  show  to 
advantage  in  a  run. 

In  i860  Lord  Stamford  again  threatened  to  resign 
at  the  end  of  the  season  1860-61,  being  taken  so 
seriously  ill  as  to  cause   Lord   Berners,  Lord  Cardigan, 


266  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

and  some  others  to  call  a  meeting  of  owners  of  coverts 
and  others  interested  in  hunting  the  two  divisions  of  the 
country,  to  consider  whether  it  was  expedient  to  make 
any,  and  if  so  what,  alterations  in  the  boundaries  of 
the  two  countries  hunted  by  Lord  Stamford  and  Mr. 
Tailby.  This  brought  forth  an  explanation  from  Lord 
Stamford. 

As  the  circumstances  relating  to  my  giving  up  the  hounds 
have  met  with  various  interpretations,  I  will  briefly  state  the  facts, 
in  order  that  those  gentlemen  connected  with  the  Hunt  may  see 
how  I  have  been  situated.  About  two  years  since  I  was  informed 
that  the  covert  fund  could  not  be  raised  ;  and  at  that  time  I  hinted 
if  such  were  the  case  another  season  I  should  be  obliged  to 
relinquish  the  mastership  of  the  Ouorn  hounds.  This  year  the 
committee  made  known  to  me,  through  one  of  its  members,  that 
they  would  be  obliged  to  give  notice  to  the  owners  of  coverts  of 
their  intention  of  giving  them  up,  owing  to  the  lack  of  funds  and 
the  unwillingness  of  the  gentlemen  of  the  Hunt  to  subscribe.  I 
felt  that  I  could  no  longer  act  as  master  of  the  Quorn  hounds,  and 
gave  notice  to  that  effect.  Within  the  last  fortnight,  however,  a 
deputation  from  the  committee,  consisting  of  Messrs.  Farnham, 
Herrick,  and  Clowes,  came  to  me  and  entered  into  an  explanation 
showing  satisfactorily  that  the  whole  difficulty  arose  from  a  want 
of  exertion  on  the  part  of  the  committee  in  not  applying  for 
subscriptions  at  the  right  time,  and  exonerating  the  gentlemen  of 
the  Hunt  from  any  sordid  motives.  On  hearing  this,  and  being 
assured  by  them  that  in  future  no  such  obstacle  should  occur,  I 
considered  I  could  not  do  less  than  continue  to  hunt  the  country 
as  before,  and  I  feel  happy  to  think  that  the  differences  be- 
tween myself  and  the  committee  have  come  to  such  a  favourable 
termination. 

There  is  not  much  else  to  record  in  connection  with 
the  closing  days  of  the  season  1 860-6 1,  except  that 
in  March  1861  the  Hon.  A.  Coventry,  while  riding  to 
covert  in  company  with  Miss  and  Mr.  Arthur  Coventry, 
broke  his  leg  by  coming  in  contact  with  a  stout  stake 
in  a  small  fence  over  which  the  party  were  making 
a   short    cut.      After   meeting    at    Beeby   on    All    Fools' 


EARL    OF    STAMFORD  267 

Day,  hounds  found  a  fox  at  Billesdon  Coplow  and  ran 
him  with  scarcely  a  check  almost  to  Shangton  Holt, 
when  Treadwell  hit  off  the  line  again  and  the  pack 
pulled  down  their  fox  near  Kibworth,  after  a  run  of  two 
hours  and  twenty  minutes. 

It  was  in  the  year  i860  that  the  Bradgate  Park  testi- 
monial was  proposed  and  carried  out.  As  the  inscription 
explained,  it  was  "  presented  to  the  Earl  and  Countess 
of  Stamford  and  Warrington  by  the  inhabitants  of 
Leicester."  The  gift  took  the  form  of  a  silver  rosewater 
dish  of  elaborate  design — so  elaborate,  indeed,  that  an 
official  description  is  perhaps  worth  reproducing. 

The  body  of  the  dish  or  salver  is  divided  into  four  compart- 
ments or  panels,  which  are  tastefully  separated  one  from  the 
other  by  groups  of  dead  fish  and  game,  and  by  cricketing  and 
sporting  trophies.  These  are  cleverly  looped  to  foxes'  heads  by 
graceful  festoons  of  fruits  and  flowers.  The  first  compartment  or 
panel  is  allegorical,  or  Britannia  offering  the  benefit  of  commerce 
to  the  four  quarters  of  the  globe.  In  the  background  is  a  correct 
view  of  Leicester  Corn  Exchange,  smoking  factories,  &c,  thereby 
identifying  the  various  trades  of  the  town  with  the  testimonial. 
The  second  compartment  represents  a  picture  of  the  far-famed  old 
oak-tree  in  Bradgate  Park,  under  the  delightful  shade  of  which  is 
seen  a  happy  picnic  party,  the  ruins  of  the  old  castle  forming  a 
picturesque  background.  The  third  panel  suggests  hunting,  a 
sport  famous  to  the  county.  The  Quorn  foxhounds  are  in  full 
cry  ;  the  earl  and  countess,  enjoying  the  invigorating  pastime, 
are  riding  side  by  side.  The  fourth  and  remaining  compartment 
is  a  faithful  representation  of  Bradgate  House.  The  whole  is 
surrounded  by  a  very  rich  and  beautiful  border  in  which  is 
represented  a  fox-hunt — the  horsemen,  hounds,  fox,  &c,  being 
exquisitely  chiselled  ;  while  to  prevent  the  eye  from  tiring  and  to 
relieve  the  composition,  it  is  divided  by  shields  upon  which  are 
prominently  chased  the  arms  of  the  town  of  Leicester  and  the 
crest  and  coronet  of  the  Earl  and  Countess. 

The  designer  of  this  dish  certainly  deserves  all  credit 
for  his  ingenuity,  for  a  more  inclusive  specimen  of  the 
silversmith's  craft  can  hardly  be  imagined. 


268  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

In  preparation  for  the  next  season  Captain  Callander 
bought  the  Toy  House  ;  and  the  Old  Club,  which  had 
been  occupied  by  the  Hon.  Major  Morgan,  was  taken 
by  Count  Batthyany.  The  gorse  planted  by  Sir  Harry 
Goodricke  had  been  burned  and  grubbed  up,  and  though 
in  some  quarters  there  were  laments  over  the  destruction 
of  the  once  favourite  covert,  Lord  Stamford  was  held  to 
have  acted  rightly,  as  the  unsportsmanlike  conduct  of  a 
neighbouring  occupier  had  for  some  years  prevented  its 
ever  holding  a  fox.  Who  this  unneighbourly  person 
was  we  are  not  told  ;  but  to  supply  the  place  of  Sir 
Harry's  Gorse,  a  new  covert  was  made  about  a  mile 
further  on.  A  Mr.  Day  appears  to  have  taken  the 
coverts  in  hand  ;  those  requiring  it  were  fresh  drained, 
and  other  steps  were  taken  to  make  the  different  coverts 
attractive  to  foxes.  The  season  was  on  the  whole  a 
good  one,  the  Ouorn  having  killed  6gh  brace  of  foxes  in 
101  days,  and  there  were  no  blank  days. 

In  August  1 86 1  there  was  a  foxhound  show  at  Yarm 
in  connection  with  the  show  of  the  Cleveland  Agricultural 
Society.  There  had  been  a  previous  show  at  Leeds, 
but  it  appeared  that  masters  of  foxhounds  had  declined 
to  show  there  because,  as  a  chronicler  said,  they  did  not 
like  "to  allow  their  favourites  to  be  mixed  up  with  the 
canine  canaille.  Perhaps,  also,  they  may  have  had  an 
idea  that  flags  were  essential  to  fair  judging."  The 
arrangements  at  Yarm,  however,  met  with  general 
approval,  and  of  fourteen  entries  in  class  two,  for  the 
best  couple  of  foxhounds  not  younger  than  one  season 
nor  older  than  two  season  hunters,  the  Ouorn  were 
highly  commended  ;  but  in  class  four,  for  the  best  puppy 
of  i860,  Lord  Stamford's  Blue  Bell,  by  Statesman- 
Blissful,  was  first. 

In  the  autumn  of  1861  the  railway  companies  appear 
to  have  turned  their  attention  to  the  accommodation  of 
hunting  men,  but  members  of  Parliament  were  their  first 


EARL    OF    STAMFORD  269 

care,  as  in  their  interest  they  started  a  train  from 
London  to  Melton  Mowbray,  which  reached  the  latter 
place  at  ten  o'clock  ;  now  it  is  possible  to  reach  there  at 
ii  few  minutes  before  eight,  travelling  by  the  newspaper 
train.  The  Ouorn  hounds  appear  to  have  had  a  run  of 
sport  in  December  1861,  and  on  the  14th  of  that  month 
it  will  be  remembered  that  the  Prince  Consort  died. 
The  news  reached  Leicestershire  on  Sunday  night,  but 
it  was  not  generally  known  until  the  arrival  of  the 
Monday's  papers  ;  meantime  a  great  number  of  horses 
had  been  sent  on  to  Thornley,  where,  instead  of  the 
hounds,  those  who  had  ridden  to  the  covert-side  found 
a  mounted  messenger  from  Lord  Stamford,  who  stated 
that,  owing  to  the  death  of  the  prince,  no  hunting  would 
take  place.  The  sad  event  threw  a  general  gloom  over 
the  Midlands,  as  over  the  rest  of  England  ;  for  the 
prince,  if  not  an  enthusiastic  fox-hunter,  had  on  occa- 
sions been  seen  at  the  covert-side  in  Leicestershire, 
and  as  a  master  of  harriers  had  played  his  part  as  a 
sportsman. 

The  threatened  resignation  of  Lord  Stamford  appears 
to  have  given  the  covert-fund  question  the  impetus  it  so 
much  needed  ;  but  the  country  at  large  sadly  wished 
that  Mr.  John  Moore  were  back  again.  When  that  able 
hunting  tactician  was  a  power  in  Melton,  he  collected 
within  a  very  small  radius  of  that  town  nearly  ,£3000, 
and,  on  one  occasion,  nearly  ,£3500,  for  Mr.  Assheton 
Smith  ;  but  Mr.  Moore  took  very  good  care  to  produce 
his  note-book  on  the  opening  day  at  Kirby  Gate,  and 
his  importunities  never  ceased  until  he  had  made  up 
his  amount.  However,  at  the  time  of  which  we  are 
speaking  matters  appear  to  have  been  in  a  hopeless 
muddle,  until  at  last,  owing  to  Lord  Stamford's  strono- 
representations,  something  had  to  be  done  ;  so  Sir  Henry 
Edwards  (on  behalf  of  the  Meltonian  division),  Mr. 
Clowes,  Mr.  Bruce  Campbell,  and  Mr.  John  Day  formed 


270  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

themselves  into  a  committee  to  place  things  on  a  better 
footing.  In  Mr.  Day  the  committee  had  a  valuable 
coadjutor,  as  he  had  previously  for  many  years  looked 
after  the  coverts.  Cream  Gorse  and  Barkby  Holt 
needed  money  to  be  expended  upon  them  ;  and  it  was 
agreed  that  sundry  alterations  should  be  made,  including 
the  planting  of  a  gorse  of  ten  acres  ;  while  some  coverts 
were  doomed,  including  Munday's  Gorse,  which  was  done 
away  with,  as  in  some  places  coverts  were  thought  to  be 
too  near  together  to  improve  the  chance  of  enjoying  a 
straight-away  run.  This  new  broom  promised  to  sweep 
very  clean,  but  it  was  not  effectual  in  keeping  Lord 
Stamford  at  the  head  of  the  hounds  for  more  than  a 
short  time  longer. 

In  February  1862  the  master  appears  to  have  been 
again  troubled  with  unruly  fields,  and  on  one  occasion 
took  his  hounds  home  ;  but  the  sting  was  somewhat 
taken  out  of  the  rebuke  by  the  fact  that  the  day  was  far 
advanced.  The  hounds  had  met  at  Beeby,  and  after  a 
disappointing  day  they  drew  John  o'  Gaunt  late  in  the 
afternoon  ;  found  a  fox,  and  from  the  manner  in  which 
hounds  ran  in  covert  and  in  a  short  ring  in  the  open,  it 
appeared  as  though  scent  had  improved  and  a  gallop 
might  take  place  after  all.  Unluckily,  however,  the 
field  were  so  elated  that  they  greatly  interfered  with  the 
hounds  ;  so  Lord  Stamford  ordered  the  hounds  back  to 
kennel,  and  declared  that  he  would  not  hunt  that  side 
of  the  country  any  more  during  the  season.  In  this 
particular,  however,  he  relented,  and  did  go  there  again. 
When  meeting  at  Barkby  they  had  a  good  run  from 
Thorpe  Trussels,  the  fox  leading  them  over  the  swollen 
Wreake.  Following  the  example  of  the  fox,  Lord  Grey 
de  Wilton  plunged  in  and  emerged  safely  on  the  other 
side.  He  was  followed  by  Captain  Williams,  who,  before 
makinor  the  crossing,  handed  his  watch  to  a  friend, 
thereby  taking  it  for  granted  that  the  friend   intended 


EARL    OF    STAMFORD  271 

going  for  a  bridge  or  a  ford.      The  field  was  regularly 
spread-eagled. 

The  fox  made  his  way  by  the  right  of  Kettleby,  as  if  for 
Holwell  Mouth,  and  sunset  was  taking  place  by  the  time  the 
hounds  reached  Piper  Hole  in  the  Belvoir  country.  There  the 
fox  might  have  saved  himself,  had  it  not  been  that  a  sheep-dog 
saw  him  taking  refuge  under  a  hedge  and  at  once  made  for  him. 
The  fox  was  fairly  blown,  and  setting  his  back  against  the  hedge 
prepared  for  battle  with  the  sheep-dog,  and  while  the  pair  were 
engaged  in  a  hand-to-hand  encounter  the  hounds  came  up  and 
finished  off  the  fox. 

No  more  than  a  few  days  later  Lord  Stamford's 
hounds  were  in  danger  of  being  run  into  whilst  huntino- 
on  the  Midland  line,  near  Ashfordby  Station.  The 
master,  on  seeing  an  approaching  train,  made  signals 
to  the  driver  to  stop,  which  he  did  at  remarkably  short 
notice,  seeing  that  neither  Westinghouse  nor  Vacuum 
brakes  were  then  invented.  Lord  Stamford  at  once 
put  his  hand  in  his  pocket  and  liberally  acknowledged 
the  good  offices  of  driver  and  fireman;  but,  in  extracting 
the  necessary  amount,  the  master  also  pulled  out  a  five- 
pound  note,  which  fluttered  unobserved  to  the  ground. 
Charles  Wells,  stud-groom  to  Mr.  Little  Gilmour,  passed 
over  the  crossing  and,  seeing  the  paper  on  the  ground, 
dismounted,  picked  it  up  and  put  it  in  his  pocket,  telling 
Mr.  Gilmour,  on  his  return  home,  what  he  had  found. 
Through  Mr.  Gilmour's  inquiries  the  owner  of  the  note 
was  discovered  ;  but  Lord  Stamford  would  not  take  it 
back,  his  directions  to  Mr.  Little  Gilmour  being  to  o-ive 
a  couple  of  sovereigns  to  his  groom,  and  the  balance  to 
the  clergyman  of  the  parish  for  the  benefit  of  the  poor. 

During  the  season  1861-62  Lord  Stamford  came  out 
oftener,  is  said  to  have  ridden  better,  and  to  have  taken 
more  interest  in  the  Hunt  than  before,  and  a  writer  of 
the  period  says  he  was  so  popular  that  "  farmers  rejoice 
to   see  him   cross   their   land,    and   villagers   send   forth 


272  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

merry   peals   from   the   church   bells   when    he    honours 
them  with  a  meet." 

This  custom  of  bell-ringing  when  the  hounds  met 
at  any  particular  village  gave  rise  to  a  law  case  at  the 
County  Public  Office,  Leicester,  early  in  April  1862. 

Mr.  D.  Waite,  a  farmer  of  Thurnby,  appeared  to  answer  a 
charge  preferred  against  him  by  the  Rev.  J.  C.  K.  Redhead,  vicar 
of  the  parish,  for  having  on  the  27th  February  been  guilty  of 
violent  and  indecent  behaviour  in  breaking  open  the  belfry  door 
of  the  parish  church.  According  to  the  evidence  it  appeared  that 
ever  since  the  year  1857  it  had  been  the  custom  of  the  church- 
wardens of  the  parish,  on  the  occasion  of  Lord  Stamford's  hounds 
meeting  there,  to  ring  the  church  bells  in  honour  of  his  lordship. 
When,  however,  the  hounds  met  on  this  particular  27th  February, 
the  vicar  gave  directions  that  the  bells  should  not  be  rung,  adding 
that  if  his  orders  were  disobeyed  he  should  take  legal  proceedings 
against  the  offending  parties.  The  hounds  were  to  meet  on  the 
Monday,  so  on  the  evening  of  the  preceding  Sunday  the  reverend 
gentleman  nailed  down  the  latch  of  the  belfry  door,  and  took  the 
precaution  of  locking  the  door  and  tying  the  key  in  it.  At  seven 
o'clock  on  Monday  morning  the  sporting  farmer  ordered  the 
parish  constable,  who  chanced  to  be  a  wheelwright,  to  open  the 
door,  which  was  accomplished  by  lifting  it  off  its  hinges;  the 
ringers  then  went  into  the  belfry  and  for  two  hours  or  more  rang 
a  merry  peal  in  honour  of  Lord  Stamford  and  his  hounds.  The 
vicar,  as  may  be  supposed,  was  in  a  great  state  of  rage  during  the 
proceedings  ;  but  the  magistrates  dismissed  the  case,  greatly  to 
the  satisfaction  of  the  fox-hunting  fraternity,  though  the  ecclesi- 
astical lawyer  may  perhaps  be  puzzled  to  account  for  the  decision. 

The  season  1861-62,  though  not  productive  of  so 
much  sport  as  the  previous  season,  was  fairly  good,  and 
there  was  a  plentiful  supply  of  foxes. 

One  curious  incident  of  the  season  1861-62  deserves 
mention.  A  fox  was  found  in  Donington  Park,  or 
rather  he  stole  away  before  the  hounds  entered  the 
covert,  and  in  the  course  of  the  run  which  ensued  he 
picked  up  a  rabbit,  and  actually  carried  it  for  some 
distance,  but  finding  the  hounds  too  close  and  the  burden 


EARL    OF    STAMFORD  273 

too  heavy,  he  wisely  dropped  his  prize  and  continued 
on  his  way.  The  incident  was  vouched  for  by  several 
people. 

In  the  summer  of  1862,  that  is  to  say,  on  the 
Thursday  between  the  Derby  and  Oaks  days,  there  died 
a  very  notable  Leicestershire  character — none  other 
than  Dick  Christian,  who,  in  the  words  of  "  The  Druid," 
had  practically  sounded  the  depth  of  every  ditch  and 
brook  in  Leicestershire.  On  Christmas  Day  i860  he 
was  seized  with  a  fit,  with  no  one  near  him  but  his  little 
grandchild,  and  since  that  time  he  had  been  quite  help- 
less and  bedridden,  and  lay  supported  by  a  frame  on 
his  bed,  with  a  pulley  by  which  he  moved  himself.  His 
last  three  days  were  attended  by  intense  pain,  and  he 
was  buried  in  the  little  Dissenters'  burial-ground  nearly 
opposite  his  house.  What  his  age  was  is  somewhat 
uncertain,  but  at  the  time  of  his  death  he  was  probably 
eighty-five.  He  rode  a  good  many  steeplechases,  though 
perhaps  he  was  not  at  his  best  in  that  department.  To 
give  Dick  Christian  his  due,  he  never  laid  claim  to 
qualities  he  did  not  possess.  He  whipped  in  to  Sir 
Gilbert  Heathcote  of  the  Cottesmore  for  some  time,  and 
occasionally,  when  Abbey,  the  huntsman,  was  unable  to 
go  out,  he  hunted  the  hounds.  He  admitted  that  he 
could  not  blow  a  horn  well  and  had  "  only  a  middling 
voice."  In  one  of  his  conversations  with  "  The  Druid  "  1 
he  said  : — 

"  I  once  made  a  bit  of  a  hit  when  I  had  hold  of  the  hounds, 
just  over  a  road.  Lord  Lonsdale  was  out.  '  Richard,'  he  says 
(he  always  spoke  that  way),  '  Richard,  that's  as  fine  a  cast  as  I 
ever  saw  made  ;  you  quite  deceived  me.'  We  brought  the  fox 
from  Mankrie  Wood  close  to  the  Bull  at  Witham  Common,  seven 
or  eight  miles,  slap  through  Woodwell  Head  right  away  to 
Melton  Spinney.  My  horse  was  so  beat  he  could  just  trot — that 
was  all  he  could  do." 


1  "Silk  and  Scarlet,"  p.  16. 


274  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

Dick  Christian's  forte  was  making  hunters.     From 
all  accounts  he  was  not  a  first-class  steeplechase  rider  ; 
but  up  to  a  certain  point  in  his  life  he  had  a  wonderfully 
good  nerve,  and  he  was  constantly  put  on  rough  horses 
with  orders  to  turn  aside  from  nothing,  and  he  certainly 
carried   out   his   directions.      He  jumped  over  a   whole 
flock  of  sheep,  and  rode  the  mare  Marigold  over  a  most 
extraordinary  drop  fence,  Marigold l  being  a  mare  which 
had    given    a    succession   of  breakers    no  little   trouble. 
He    always    maintained    that    he    had    never    ridden    a 
better  horse  than  Corringham  ;  but  no  valid  reason  was 
ever    forthcoming   for    this    preference,   seeing    that    for 
about  twenty  years  at   Melton  he  rode  the  best  horses 
that  a  farmer  could  breed  or  a  dealer  could  buy.      For 
about  eighteen  years  he  was  in  the  employ  of  Lord  Scar- 
borough, and  he  made  all  his  horses  ;  but  from  various 
accounts  Dick  Christian  never  rode  in  either  the  Rufford 
or  the  Grove  countries  as  he  rode  in  Leicestershire.      In 
the  Ouorn  country  he  once  killed  a  horse  belonging  to 
Mr.  Frank  Foljambe,  an  occurrence  which  long  haunted 
him  ;  "  It  was  the  only  horse  that  ever  died  in  my  hands," 
he    used    to    say.     On   the   opening  day  of  the   season 
1857-58  Dick  made  his  appearance  at  Kirby  Gate,  where 
he  held  quite  a  levee.     Mr.  Leslie,  to  whom  his  son  was 
groom,   gave   him  an  occasional  mount  afterwards,   but 
otherwise  he  was  never  at  the  covert-side  ;  when  he  did 
come  out  he  never  attempted  to  ride,  so  it  seems  quite  a 
mistake  to  suppose  that  he  rode  boldly  up  to  the  last. 
One  of  his  biographers  says  that  he  was  extravagant, 
but  a  man  in  his  position,  with  twenty  children  "all  born 
alive  and  christened,"  could  not  have  saved  much.      His 
language  is  said  to  have  been  particularly  free  from  any- 
thing like  coarseness,  and  in  his  way  he  was  a  decided 
humorist.      Before  his  death,  more  than  one  appeal  wa9 
made  for  funds  to  enable  him  to  end  his  days  in  com- 

1  See  p.  190. 


EARL    OF    STAMFORD  275 

parative  comfort,  and  they  met  with  a  generous  response  ; 
but  his  wife  died  at  an  advanced  age  in  the  workhouse, 
some  years  after  her  husband's  decease. 

In  the  November  of  1862  it  was  quite  well  under- 
stood that  Lord  Stamford  would  vacate  the  Ouorn 
country  at  the  end  of  the  season,  and  it  was  said  that 
John  Treadwell  would  remain  on  as  huntsman  with  Lord 
Stamford's  successor  ;  but  this  rumour  proved  to  be  un- 
true, as  when  Lord  Stamford  finally  gave  up  the  Quorn 
country  Treadwell  left  and  took  service  under  his  old 
master,  Mr.  Henley  Greaves,  who  was  then  hunting  the 
old  Berkshire  country  ;  and  there  he  remained  from  1863 
until  1882,  when  he  resigned,  having  hunted  under  seve- 
ral masters,  including  the  Messrs.  Charles  and  Thomas 
Duffield,  and  Lord  Craven.  Treadwell  died  in  1895, 
and  was  buried  at  Kingston  Bagpuze,  Berkshire,  in  a 
grave  not  far  from  that  of  his  old  master,  Mr.  Thomas 
Duffield,  under  whom  he  worked  for  about  nine  seasons. 
At  every  Hunt  dinner  in  the  old  Berkshire  country,  one 
or  other  of  the  speakers  paid  a  tribute  of  praise  to 
Treadwell's  skill  as  a  huntsman,  and  expressed  himself 
grateful  for  the  sport  shown.  In  1878  he  was  presented 
with  a  silver  teapot,  a  hunting  watch,  and  a  purse  of  600 
guineas.  At  the  time  of  his  death  he  was  seventy-three 
years  of  age. 

As  Lord  Stamford's  last  season  drew  to  a  close 
some  very  fair  sport  was  enjoyed.  During  the  month 
of  March  1863  a  goodly  number  of  afternoon  runs  took 
place,  and  about  the  middle  of  the  month  they  had  a 
very  fast  thing  from  Lord  Aylesford's  covert  down  to 
the  river  below  Hoby.  They  crossed  the  water  close 
to  the  spot  where  on  a  former  occasion  Lords  Gardner 
and  Brudenell  swam  their  horses  across.  On  this  occa- 
sion no  one  attempted  the  passage  by  water,  so  by 
common  assent  the  whole  of  the  large  field  galloped  up 
towards  the  Old  Mill  to  a  footbridge.       It  appeared,  as 


276  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

an  eye-witness  wrote,  almost  as  great  a  risk  to  cross  by 
this  bridge  as  to  swim  the  river  ;  but  all  went  safely 
over,  and  as  the  hounds  luckily  came  to  a  check  above 
Rotherby,  the  foremost  of  the  field  were  enabled  to  catch 
them  up  before  they  killed  their  fox  near  the  Leicester 
turnpike  road. 

Lord  Stamford  had  for  seven  years  hunted  the 
country  in  such  liberal  style  and  so  efficiently  that  it 
struck  "  A  Notts  Fox-hunter  "  his  lordship's  retirement 
should  be  marked  by  the  presentation  of  a  testimonial. 
Whether  the  suggestion  did  not  emanate  from  the  proper 
quarter,  or  whether  there  was  some  other  reason  for  the 
apathy  which  prevailed,  the  writer  has  not  been  able  to 
discover  ;  but  the  idea  does  not  appear  to  have  been 
taken  up,  and  no  presentation  was  then  made. 

Lord  Stamford's  last  advertised  day  was  Friday  the 
27th  of  March,  Garenden  Park  being  the  fixture.  The 
ground  was  as  hard  as  a  paving-stone,  but  the  wind  had 
veered  round  to  the  north  ;  there  was  no  bright  sun,  so 
people  hoped  that  the  end  of  the  season  might  be  marked 
with  a  run. 

An  old  dog  fox  went  away  directly  and,  at  a  good  pace,  ran 
as  if  for  Charnwood  Forest,  by  Chartley  and  the  rocky  steeps  of 
Beacon  Hill,  through  Ratcliffe,  Bradgate  Park,  under  the  old 
ruins  and  over  the  brook  by  Grooby  Lake,  his  point  apparently 
being  Enderby.  Turning  to  the  left  the  fox  crossed  some  hard 
and  dusty  fallows,  over  which  hounds  had  to  hunt  so  slowly 
that  every  one  began  to  think  sport  was  over  for  the  day.  A 
capital  sportsman,  however,  who  lived  at  Charnwood,  viewed  the 
fox  ;  Lord  Stamford  blew  his  horn,  and  hounds  again  began  to 
run,  the  line  being  through  the  Sandhills,  Bradgate  Park,  up  to 
Swithland,  where,  after  a  run  of  two  hours  and  twenty  minutes, 
the  fox  was  pulled  down  near  the  brook.  At  the  suggestion  of 
Mr.  Heygate,  M.P.,  three  cheers  were  given  for  the  master  and 
another  cheer  was  added  for  Treadwell.  Then  Mr.  Clowes,  in  a 
few  well-chosen  words,  thanked  the  master  for  the  munificent  and 
noble  manner  in  which  he  had  hunted  the  country  for  the  last 
seven  seasons,  and  for  the  sport  he  had  afforded. 


EARL    OF    STAMFORD  277 

It  was  said  at  the  time  that  Leicestershire  had  never 
known  a  more  popular  master  of  hounds  than  Lord 
Stamford,  and  there  was  every  reason,  it  was  stated,  to 
think  that  his  lordship  would  have  continued  to  hunt  the 
country  but  from  a  feeling  of  annoyance  or  disappoint- 
ment with  certain  nameless  owmers  of  coverts  who  had 
promised  to  preserve  foxes  for  him,  but  had  failed  to 
carry  out  what  they  had  professed  themselves  ready  to  do. 

Lord  Stamford's  sale  took  place  at  Ouorn  on  Satur- 
day the  9th  May  1863.  Messrs  Tattersall,  who  con- 
ducted the  proceedings,  expected  no  more  than  about  a 
couple  of  thousand  persons,  and  made  arrangements  for 
that  number. 

They  found,  however,  that  a  great  many  more  would  be 
present,  and  so  set  about  putting  up  some  substantial  posts  and 
rails,  around  which  about  seven  thousand  persons  assembled. 
Colonel  Thomas,  well  known  in  the  Heythrop  country,  had  run 
down  to  Quorn  during  the  previous  week  to  see  if  there  was  any- 
thing likely  to  suit  the  Prince  of  Wales,  and  as  the  result  of  his 
report  General  Hood  gave  500  guineas  for  Bentinck,  and  310 
guineas  for  the  Right  Man.  Trumpeter's  reserve  price  was  600 
guineas.  With  one  or  two  exceptions  all  the  horses  brought  as 
much  as,  or  more  than,  they  originally  cost,  and  the  total  sum 
realised  by  seventy-nine  horses  was  14,350  guineas,  giving  an 
average  of  nearly  182  guineas  each.  The  Prince  of  Orange  in- 
tended being  present,  but  he  missed  his  train.  Special  trains 
were  run  from  Derby,  Leicester,  and  other  places,  while  there 
was  a  great  collection  of  horse-boxes  at  Barrow  Station  for  the 
convenience  of  purchasers.  The  late  Mr.  Edmund  Tattersall 
conducted  the  sale.  The  Emperor  of  the  French  sent  over  Mr. 
Gamble,  the  superintendent  of  the  Royal  stables  at  the  Louvre  ; 
but  it  is  believed  that  he  went  home  without  buying  anything. 
Among  those  present  were  the  Duke  of  Buccleuch,  Lords  Henry 
Bentinck,  Middleton,  Galway,  Dacre,  and  Eglinton  ;  the  Marquis 
of  Hastings,  Lord  Algernon  St.  Maur  (afterwards  Duke  of  Somer- 
set), Lords  Ingestre,  Gardner,  Harrington,  Hopetoun,  Sir  F. 
Johnstone,  Mr.  Clowes,  Mr.  George  Lane  Fox,  Mr.  Hall,  Mr. 
W.  G.  Craven,  &c. 


278  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

This  was  a  very  remarkable  sale  of  hunters,  the  horses 
being  all  of  the  very  highest  class.  That  Lord  Stamford 
meant  to  do  well  by  the  Quorn  Hunt  is  apparent  from 
the  fact  that  he  gave  ^"500  a  year  towards  the  mainte- 
nance of  the  hounds  when  Mr.  Clowes  took  them  over. 

Lord  Stamford,  who  died  early  in  1883,  was  born  at 
Enville  Hall,  in  Staffordshire,  in  1827,  so  that  he  was 
only  just  thirty  years  old  when  he  took  the  Quorn  country 
in  1858  under  the  circumstances  already  noted. 

George  Harry  Grey  was  the  eldest  of  five  children,  three  of 
whom  predeceased  him.  In  early  years  he  was  sent  to  the 
famous  school  near  Hatfield  of  the  Rev.  B.  Peile,  under  whose 
care  many  young  noblemen  and  men  of  good  family  were  placed. 
At  Mr.  Peile's  he  had  for  companions  the  present  Duke  of  West- 
minster, Lord  Derby,  Lord  Lichfield,  Lord  Harewood,  Lord 
Howe,  and  many  other  well-known  men,  sportsmen  and  other- 
wise. Lord  Stamford  was  never  at  a  public  school,  going  direct 
from  Mr.  Peile's  to  Cambridge.  His  ancestor,  Henry  de  Grey,  is 
said 1  to  have  carried  the  horn  in  the  time  of  Richard  I.,  and 
following  in  the  steps  of  his  ancestor,  Lord  Stamford  had  in  him 
the  interest  of  an  ardent  fox-hunter,  and  soon  after  attaining  his 
majority  he  hunted  the  Albrighton  country  for  a  time  from  Enville 
Hall,  and  then  he  took  the  Quorn  country  in  the  circumstances 
mentioned  above. 

Lord  Stamford  was  a  great  cricketer,  and  played  a 
good  deal  at  Lords,  while  at  Enville  Hall  he  laid  out  a 
private  ground  which  was  considered  quite  equal  to  any 
in  England. 

Shooting,  too,  was  another  of  Lord  Stamford's 
favourite  pursuits.  At  both  Enville  Hall  and  Brad- 
gate  Park  much  excellent  sport  was  enjoyed,  though  at 
neither  place  was  game  ever  sacrificed  to  foxes,  and  his 
lordship's  records2  show  that  foxes  and  pheasants  can 
live  together  if  it  be  intended  that  they  should  do  so.     It 

1  See  Field,  January  6,  1883. 

2  On  the  15th  December  1856,  and  four  following  days,  shooting  parties 
varying  from  eight  to  eleven  guns  shot  3666  head,  of  which  1388  were 
pheasants,  1164  hares,  1010  rabbits,  47  partridges,  and  35  woodcock.     In 


EARL    OF    STAMFORD 


279 


was  owing  to  his  shooting  in  Scotland  that  his  death  was 
attributed.  He  rented  the  deer  forest  of  Aviemore,  near 
Glenmore,  and  having  built  a  new  wing  to  the  lodge,  he 
proceeded  to  live  in  the  lately  erected  portion  before  the 
place  was  dry  ;  he  contracted  a  chill,  and  a  bad  attack  of 
typhoid  fever  supervened  ;  but  he  recovered  from  that. 
His  constitution,  however,  was  greatly  weakened  by 
what  he  had  gone  through,  and  at  Newmarket,  whither 
he  went  on  his  return  from  the  North,  he  was  quite  a 
wreck.  Thus  passed  away  a  great  sportsman,  a  kind 
landlord,  and  an  extremely  popular  master  of  hounds. 

January  1857  there  was  a  shooting  party  at  Bradgate  Park,  when  on  some 
days  nine  guns,  on  others  eleven,  killed  in  seven  days  no  fewer  than  71 19 
head,  2087  being  pheasants,  523  hares,  and  4394  rabbits.  From  November 
1 1  to  20,  both  dates  inclusive,  Lord  Stamford  and  party  killed  889  partridges, 
1076  pheasants,  1403  hares,  and  593  rabbits. 


1 


>-.*$ 


^ffiil 


CHAPTER    X 

MR.    CLOWES    (1863-1866) 

MARQUIS    OF    HASTINGS    (1866-1868) 

MR.   JOHN    CHAWORTH    MUSTERS    (1868-1870) 


z8x 


CHAPTER   X 

MR.    CLOWES 
1863-1866 

THE  successor  to  Lord  Stamford  was  Mr.  Clowes, 
and  at  the  outset  one  may  be  permitted  to  say  that 
never  did  a  good  sportsman  have  more  wretched  luck  to 
contend  against.  It  may  rather  be  taking  the  end  of  the 
story  first,  but  perhaps  a  summary  of  his  mastership  will 
in  a  manner  explain  what  follows. 

So  far  as  horses,  hounds,  and  foxes  were  concerned, 
chance  favoured  him.  Very  few  horses  were  killed;  one 
of  them,  however,  was  Goddard's  favourite  hunter,  which 
met  its  end  in  the  Widmerpool  country,  and  the  other 
two  were  less  important  animals.  But  the  weather  was 
absolutely  against  Mr.  Clowes  from  first  to  last.  He 
bought  Lord  Stamford's  pack  for  7*2000,  collected  to- 
gether a  capital  stud  of  horses,  and  started  with  every 
prospect  of  success.  In  his  very  first  season,  however, 
that  is  to  say,  1863-64,  after  Christmas,  frost  and  snow 
spoiled  all  the  fun  and  neutralised  all  the  master's  exer- 
tions ;  and  this  bad  weather  lasted  into  March,  for  even 
his  last  day  was  postponed  through  a  heavy  fall  of  snow. 

In  the  next  season  the  exceptionally  dry  summer  and 

autumn  reduced  cub-hunting  almost   to  a  farce,  for  the 

hounds  could  hunt  a  cub  no  further  than  they  could  see 

him,  and  when  November  came  round  the  land  was  as 

hard  as  it  could  well  be.      There   was  not  a  scrap   of 

scent,  and  then  when  rain  did  come  in  December,  it  was 

283 


284  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

accompanied  by  such  hurricanes  of  wind  that  sport  was 
out  of  the  question.  Frost  and  snow  held  sway  in 
January  and  February,  and  then  the  country  rapidly 
dried  up  after  the  beginning  of  March.  Mr.  Clowes's 
last  season  was  a  decided  improvement  on  the  other  two 
in  many  respects,  but  instead  of  hard,  they  had  to  put  up 
with  deep,  ground,  for  horses  went  up  to  their  hocks  in 
mud  from  the  beginning  of  November,  and  hunting  was 
scarcely  stopped  at  all  by  reason  of  frost. 

To  a  certain  extent  the  deep  ground  was  an  advan- 
tage, as  the  greatest  "  thrusters  "  in  Leicestershire  could 
not  manage  to  override  the  hounds  ;  and,  like  a  good 
sportsman,  Mr.  Clowes  took  advantage  of  the  open 
season  to  hunt  the  country  very  fairly  from  one  end  to 
the  other.  The  master  hunted  four  days  a  week,  but 
that  was  thought  scarcely  sufficient  for  so  wide  a  country, 
in  order  that  the  owners  of  coverts  from  Staunton 
Harold  to  John  o'  Gaunt  might  be  satisfied. 

Towards  the  end  of  Ins  last  season  several  coverts 
on  the  Donington  side  were  blank,  especially  Breedon 
Clouds  and  the  Aspinalls  ;  Scraptoft  Gorse,  too,  failed 
to  hold  as  a  rule,  and  that  was  rather  a  serious  matter, 
as  several  little  coverts  round  about  drew  their  supplies 
from  that  famous  stronghold.  Many  people  thought 
that  the  vulpicide  had  been  at  his  unwelcome  work,  but 
from  several  accounts  it  seems  that  the  foxes  had  for- 
saken many  of  their  usual  haunts,  and  no  one  knew 
where  to  find  them.  Sometimes  they  were  kicked  up 
out  of  the  open  fields,  at  others  they  were  started  out  of 
the  hedgerows.  All  the  Leicestershire  men  sympathised 
most  sincerely  with  Mr.  Clowes  in  his  run  of  ill-luck. 

Before  the  resignation  of  Lord  Stamford  (as  will 
presently  appear),  Mr.  Clowes  had  worked  hard  in  the 
interests  of  the  Quorn  Hunt,  taking  upon  his  shoulders 
sundry  burdens  ;  and  when  he  agreed  to  succeed  Lord 
Stamford  he  knew  how  much  trouble  he  would  have  to 


MR.    CLOWES  285 

face,  but  like  the  good  sportsman  that  he  was,  he  ran  all 
the  risks  and  met  with  a  very  poor  return,  owing  to  the 
weather. 

Not  for  the  first  time  during  Mr.  Clowes's  mastership 
did  the  question  of  wire-fencing  come  up  for  argument, 
and  in  the  autumn  of  the  new  master's  first  season 
(1863-64)  a  manifesto  was  put  forth  by  sundry  land- 
owners and  sportsmen  in  the  counties  of  Leicestershire 
and  Northamptonshire  stating  that  they  had  observed 
with  deep  regret  the  increasing  practice  of  fencing  with 
wire  as  a  substitute  for  rails,  as  well  as  for  stopping  gaps. 
They  pointed  out  that  this  new  kind  of  fencing  was 
dangerous  both  to  men  and  horses,  and  that,  if  persisted 
in,  it  would  entirely  put  a  stop  to  hunting.  The  signa- 
tories to  the  document  could  not  for  a  moment  imagine 
that  the  farmers  in  general  would  desire  such  an 
eventuality,  and  they  hoped  that  the  tenant-farmers 
would  consider  whether  it  would  not  be  advisable  to 
discontinue  the  use  of  wire,  at  least  from  November  to 
April.  Shortly  after,  however,  in  the  columns  of  the 
Field,  that  is  to  say,  in  the  issue  of  November  7,  1863, 
there  appeared  a  letter  in  favour  of  wire-fencing,  penned 
by  Mr.  E.  A.  Paget.1 

Before  Mr.  Clowes's  first  season  opened,  the  fine 
stables  built  by  Mr.  Lyne  Stephens  found  a  new  tenant 
in  Mr.  Chaplin,  who  therein  housed  eighteen  fine  hunters. 
For  some  reason  or  other  a  prejudice  had  existed  against 
these  stables,  which,  until  Mr.  Chaplin  took  them,  were 
unoccupied  for  many  years. 

Owing  to  various  circumstances,  bad  weather  in- 
cluded, Mr.  Clowes's  opening  day  with  the  Ouorn  at 
Kirby  Gate  (1863)  was  not  quite  such  a  brilliant  function 

1  The  question  of  wire-fencing  appears  to  have  first  cropped  up  in 
Leicestershire  about  1858,  though  I  fancy  something  was  said  about  it  in 
the  time  of  Sir  Richard  Sutton,  and  towards  the  close  of  Lord  Stamford's 
mastership  it  became  something  of  a  burning  question.  During  more  recent 
years  wire  has  been  taken  down  and  replaced  at  the  expense  of  the  Hunt. 


286  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

as  usual.  Atmospheric  conditions  were  adverse,  and 
rather  poor  sport  was  experienced,  but  the  Leicestershire 
ranks  were  at  this  time  recruited  by  Mr.  Bromley  Daven- 
port, whose  essays  on  sport,  and  hunting  poems,  have  been 
so  much  appreciated.  He  took  the  house  of  the  welter- 
weight Colonel  Wyndham,  put  it  into  repair,  and  hunted 
for  a  season  or  two  more  with  the  Quorn,  with  which 
pack  he  had  always  appeared  in  the  first  flight.  Early 
in  the  season  the  Quorn  had  a  very  fair  run  from 
Wartnaby  Stone-pits. 

They  found  a  fox  at  Welby  Fishponds,  hounds  running  at  a 
great  rate  towards  Ashfordby,  most  of  the  field  being  left  behind. 
The  fox  ran  up  wind,  crossed  the  river  Wreake,  but  luckily  within 
convenient  distance  of  a  bridge,  over  which  the  few  men  who 
secured  a  good  start  passed,  and  managed  to  keep  somewhere  near 
hounds.  Then  the  fox  went  over  the  railway,  turned  to  the  left, 
and  eventually  made  his  way  into  Melton  parish,  and  from  there 
went  tolerably  straight  for  Mr.  Burbage's  new  covert,  hounds 
running  fast  all  the  time,  and  when  they  reached  the  last-men- 
tioned covert  fifty  minutes  had  elapsed  from  the  start.  The  good 
sportsman  who  owned  the  place  was  first  up,  with  Lord  Wilton 
not  very  far  behind  him,  and  then  either  the  run  fox  or  a  substi- 
tute went  across  the  river  to  Stapleford,  and  getting  into  the  park 
among  the  deer  hounds  had  to  give  up,  after  a  capital  run  of 
something  over  an  hour. 

We  next  come  to  rather  a  curious  complaint  as  to  Mr.  Clowes's 
hounds.  It  was  said  that  instead  of  working  slowly  and  following 
the  scent  quietly,  as  they  used  to  do,  hounds  ran  very  much  faster, 
and  nine-tenths  of  the  runs  resolved  themselves  into  a  race,  con- 
sequently the  bulk  of  the  field  saw  little  or  nothing  of  what  took 
place,  unless  by  short  cuts  or  dodging  they  happened  to  drop  in 
when  the  hounds  took  a  turn. 

This,  it  must  be  remembered,  was  not  in  the  olden 
days  of  hunting — though  even  then,  at  any  rate  in  the 
time  of  Mr.  Warde  and  Mr.  Meynell,  hounds  were  not 
slow — but  no  longer  ago  than  1863,  so  one  can  hardly 
understand  the    meaning  of  the   criticism.      The   letter, 


MR.    CLOWES  287 

however,  wound  up  with  the  intimation  that  Mr.  Clowes 
had  just  gone  away  to  be  married. 

The  excitement  in  connection  with  the  wire-fencing 
appears  to  have  soon  subsided,  several  farmers  having 
agreed  to  take  it  down  during  the  hunting  season,  while 
in  Mr.  Tailby's  country  they,  almost  to  a  man,  readily 
freed  the  fields  from  that  scourge,  so  in  acknowledg- 
ment a  considerable  sum  of  money  was  subscribed  to 
increase  the  prizes  at  the  farmers'  races.  There  was  one 
farmer,  however,  in  the  Ouorn  country  who,  although  he 
did  not  employ  wire  as  a  means  of  fencing,  was  a  very 
fine  hand  at  preserving  some  strong  and  high  posts  and 
rails  and  ox  fences.  He  lived  in  a  favourite  district,  and, 
in  years  gone  by,  was  accustomed  to  say  that  he  saw  two 
men  only  fit  to  go  out  hunting.  One  was  Mr.  Gressley 
Wilson  and  the  other  Lord  Alvanley,  who,  in  their 
hardest  riding  days,  were  the  only  pair,  he  averred,  he 
ever  saw  go  straight  across  his  farm.  This  certainly 
speaks  volumes  for  the  strength  of  his  fences  and  the 
nerve  of  the  two  horsemen  in  question. 

As  soon  as  the  year  1864  dawned  sport  was  greatly 
interfered  with  by  frost  and  fog,  and  it  was  not  till  the 
end  of  the  month,  when  the  hounds  met  at  Great  Dalby, 
that  there  was  an  appearance  of  anything  like  decent 
hunting  weather.  The  hounds  drew  Gartree  Hill  blank, 
and  then  down  came  the  fog  so  thickly  that  although 
they  found  a  fox  in  Thorpe  Trussells  they  might  as 
well  have  run  him  in  the  middle  of  the  night.  The 
field  nearly  lost  the  pack,  and  the  foremost  could  only 
ride  to  them  by  strongly  putting  to  the  test  their  sense  of 
hearing.  On  the  following  Saturday,  when  they  met  at 
Beaumanor,  Lord  Stamford  came  out  for  the  first  time 
in  that  year. 

As  the  season  1863-64  neared  its  end,  Mr.  Bromley 
Davenport  sustained  a  bad  fall  early  in  March.  The 
hounds    were    running    very    fast    from    Cream    Gorse 


288  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

towards  Frisby,  and  when  near  the  Leicester  road 
Mr.  Davenport's  horse — he  was  then,  by  the  way,  Mr. 
Davenport  Bromley — galloped  into  a  "grip,"  turned  a 
complete  somersault,  and  threw  its  rider  very  heavily  upon 
his  head.  He  was  picked  up  in  an  insensible  condition, 
but  afterwards  came  round  and  was  taken  home. 

The  readers  of  a  well-known  sporting  paper  were  also 
horrified  about  this  time  to  hear  of  a  fatal  accident  which 
was  stated  to  have  occurred  while  the  Quorn  were  hunt- 
ing near  Willoughby,  to  a  certain  Sir  B.  Hichens,  who 
was  said  to  have  been  well  known  for  many  years  with  the 
Quorn  hounds.  With  great  attention  to  detail,  it  was  stated 
that  his  horse,  a  young  thoroughbred  chestnut,  became 
unmanageable  when  the  hounds  found,  and  eventually 
running  away  with  his  rider,  took  a  five-barred  gate,  and 
then  collided  with  a  plough  which  lay  in  his  track.  The 
horse,  the  account  went  on,  did  not  perceive  it ;  a  fearful 
fall  resulted,  and  the  unfortunate  gentleman,  after  being 
picked  up  in  an  insensible  condition,  was  taken  to  a  farm- 
house, never  rallied,  and  died  in  a  few  hours.  The  horse 
was  killed  on  the  spot  by  one  of  the  iron  handles  of  the 
plough  entering  his  body.  Meantime  everybody  was 
asking  who  Sir  B.  Hichens  was.  Nobody  in  the  Quorn 
country  had  ever  heard  his  name,  and  as  a  matter  of  fact 
no  such  person  existed,  the  whole  thing  being  a  stupid 
hoax. 

The  spring  of  1864  was  memorable  from  the  fact  that 
the  first  Grand  National  Hunt  Steeplechase  was  run 
over  the  Melton  Mowbray  country,  the  stewards  being 
the  Duke  of  Beaufort,  the  Marquis  of  Hastings,  Lord 
Coventry,  Lord  Grosvenor,  Lord  Grey  de  Wilton,  Lord 
Walter  Scott,  the  Hon.  G.  Fitzwilliam,  Mr.  George  Lane 
Fox,  Mr.  Clowes,  Mr.  W.  W.  Tailby,  Mr.  B.  J.  Angell, 
and  Mr.  G.  Craven  ;  while  the  judge  was  Mr.  R.  Johnson. 
Four  years  previously  "  Fog  "  Rowlands,  as  Mr.  Fother- 
gill   Rowlands,   of  turf  celebrity,  was   commonly   called, 


MR.    CLOWES  289 

tried  to  inaugurate  a  similar  contest  in  the  Market  Har- 
borough  country,  but  met  with  scant  support,  chiefly,  it 
is  supposed,  because  of  the  objection  entertained  to  the 
ridge  and  furrow  which  abounded  in  that  district.  On 
this  occasion,  however,  the  matter  came  off.  A  horse 
called  Cooksboro'  was  first  past  the  post,  but  there 
was  an  objection  (entertained  at  Epsom)  on  account  of 
Mr.  Loton,  the  rider,  not  being  qualified  either  as  a 
farmer  or  a  gentleman  rider,  and  the  race  was  eventu- 
ally awarded  to  the  Game  Chicken,  ridden  by  Captain 
Smith.  Cooksboro'  came  in  first  by  five  lengths,  Game 
Chicken  was  a  length  in  advance  of  Sir  Stephen,  who 
in  turn  was  four  lengths  in  advance  of  Crusade  ;  Tri- 
angle was  fifth,  and  The  Miller  sixth  ;  and  these  were 
all  which  passed  the  post  out  of  twenty-eight  starters. 
It  cannot  be  said  that  the  Grand  National  Hunt  race 
has  maintained  its  character  ;   but  this  is  by  the  way. 

About  the  same  time  (April)  was  recorded  the  death 
of  the  last  of  the  four  M's — Mr.  Maxse — who,  together 
with  Mr.  Moore,  Mr.  Valentine  Maher,  and  Sir  James 
Musgrave,  were  so  long  familiar  figures  with  the  Ouorn. 
Mr  Maxse  hunted  in  the  days  of  Assheton  Smith,  and 
they  were  said  to  be  an  uncommonly  silent  pair  ;  and 
Mr.  Maxse,  it  may  be  remembered,  was  limited  to  a 
pint  of  port  a  day  by  Mr.  Smith,  the  Squire  saying  that 
if  he  drank  more  he  would  get  too  fat  to  ride. 

The  results  of  the  season  1863-64  were  that  the 
Quorn  were  out  eighty  days,  killed  thirty-three  brace 
of  foxes,  and  had  only  one  blank  clay,  which  was  from 
Bunny,  when  the  weather  was  something  awful.  There 
were  fifty-six  couples  of  working  hounds  in  kennel, 
and  perhaps  their  best  run  was  one  of  two  hours  in 
December,  from  Grace  Dieu,  the  fox  being  killed  near 
Leake  Pit  House  ;  while  there  was  another  very  good 
forty-five  minutes  from  Walton  Thorns  to  Willoughby 
Gorse.       One  fox    was    killed,    and    the   same   alternoon 

T 


290  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

there  was  a  good  run  from  Grimston  Gorse  to   Melton 
Spinney. 

Nothing  of  much  importance  appears  to  have  hap- 
pened at  the  opening  of  the  season  1864-65,  but  with 
December  sport  improved,  and  under  Mr.  Clowes  the 
Ouorn  enjoyed  a  series  of  good  runs  in  the  last  month 
of  the  year.  Early  in  December  they  had  a  capital  hour 
and  twenty  minutes  from  Scraptoft  Spinneys,  across  by 
Glen  Gorse,  and  round  by  Wigston,  hounds  killing 
their  fox  on  the  Harborough  turnpike  road  ;  but  this 
run  was  eclipsed  by  one  which  took  place  a  few  days 
afterwards  from  Bunny  Woods.  Hounds  simply  raced 
for  six  miles  as  far  as  Hicklin,  and  then,  at  a  somewhat 
slower  pace,  hunted  their  fox  on  to  Clawson  Thorns, 
where  he  managed  to  get  away.  In  this  run  Mr. 
Gilmour's  horse  put  its  foot  in  a  rabbit-hole,  and  gave 
its  rider  a  heavy  fall,  which  kept  that  excellent  sports- 
man out  of  the  saddle  for  some  little  time. 

Early  in  the  new  year  frost  set  in,  and  what  was 
hoped  would  have  been  one  of  the  best  seasons  Leices- 
tershire had  known  for  some  time  was  quite  marred  by 
the  hard  ground. 

It  was  in  the  year  1865  that  the  Grand  National  was 
won  by  Alcibiade,  belonging  to  Mr.  B.  J.  Angell,  con- 
sequently all  Leicestershire  was  in  a  state  of  rejoicing. 
Mr.  Coventry  rode  the  horse,  and  it  was  said  that  he, 
Mr.  Angell,  Captain  Coventry,  and  two  others  divided 
something  like  ,£30,000  between  them  over  the  event ; 
the  sporting  Leicestershire  folk  were  additionally  glad  of 
the  victory,  because  the  rider  of  Alcibiade  took  his  first 
lessons  in  horsemanship  in  the  neighbourhood  of  Melton. 

In  January  1866  Mr.  Clowes  had  a  somewhat  novel 
experience.  The  hounds  were  hunting  in  the  neighbour- 
hood of  Nether  Broughton,  and  on  reaching  a  wheat 
field  belonging  to  a  farmer  named  Brett,  the  master 
and    his   followers    were    somewhat    astonished    to   find 


MR.    CLOWES  291 

their  progress  barred.  A  body  of  labourers  armed  with 
sticks  were  drawn  up  in  front  of  the  field,  while  the 
farmer  briefly  explained  that  he  did  not  mean  to  have 
his  crops  destroyed.  The  impromptu  army  under  Mr. 
Brett's  command  brandished  their  sticks,  and  effectu- 
ally kept  both  the  hounds  and  field  from  crossing  his 
property.  So  Mr.  Clowes  accepted  the  situation,  and 
went  home. 

At  the  beginning  of  the  season  1865-66  the  master 
expressed  his  intention  of  resigning,  and  in  January 
1866  the  sale  of  the  hounds  in  April  was  announced. 
Then  people  began  to  wonder  how  they  could  keep  Mr. 
Clowes  in  office,  and  on  being  approached,  he  was  half 
inclined  to  say  that  he  would  continue  to  hunt,  provided 
the  subscriptions  were  paid,  and  a  reasonable  sum  was 
given  to  him  to  carry  on  the  hounds.  Early  in  March  a 
meeting,  however,  was  held  at  the  Bell  Hotel,  Leicester- 
shire, to  make  some  arrangements  for  the  future  hunting 
of  the  country,  in  consequence  of  Mr.  Clowes's  announced 
intention  of  giving  up  the  hounds.  Mr.  Herrick  was  in 
the  chair,  while  Lord  Wilton,  Sir  Frederick  Fowke, 
Mr  Little  Gilmour,  Mr.  Heygate,  Mr.  Clowes,  Mr. 
Charlton,  and  Mr.  Ernest  Chaplin  were  among  those 
present.  Not  for  the  first  time  was  the  proposal  made 
(on  this  occasion  by  Lord  Wilton)  that  a  committee 
should  be  appointed  for  managing  the  rented  coverts  ; 
but  perhaps  the  best  history  of  Mr.  Clowes's  resignation 
comes  from  his  own  lips.  Early  in  July  the  ex-master 
was  entertained  at  dinner,  and  was  presented  with  a 
testimonial,  and  in  returning  thanks  for  the  toast  of  his 
health,  he  gave  a  succinct  account  of  what  had  led  up  to 
the  crisis  : — 

Before  Lord  Stamford  gave  up  the  country,  the  then  committee 
had  ceased  to  pay  any  attention  to  business ;  they  were  in  debt, 
and  not  being  able  to  obtain  subscriptions  to  pay  for  the  coverts, 
they  were  obliged  to  represent  the  actual  condition  of  things  to 


292  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

Lord  Stamford,  and  it  was  no  wonder  his  lordship  said  he  should 
retire  at  the  termination  of  the  season.  He  (Mr.  Clowes)  then 
tried  hard  all  the  winter,  and  became  tired  of  making  the  neces- 
sary efforts ;  he  could  not  obtain  a  committee ;  so  he  took  upon 
himself  to  rent  the  coverts.  The  season  being  over,  he  inquired 
of  Lord  Stamford  if  he  were  going  on  again,  and  on  receiving  an 
affirmative  reply,  Mr.  Clowes  again  undertook  the  coverts.  The 
next  season  saw  the  actual  retirement  of  Lord  Stamford,  the 
committee  were  again  placed  in  their  old  position,  and  then  Mr. 
Clowes  offered  to  get  a  pack  of  hounds,  and  hunt  the  country  in 
the  best  manner  he  could,  if  ^1600  a  year  could  be  raised.  The 
ex-master  then  went  on  to  say  that  he  had  carried  on  the  country 
for  the  last  three  years,  but  now  they  were  in  a  mess  again,  and 
he  proceeded  to  explain  why  he  relinquished  the  mastership.  He 
had  thought  that  if  he  had  so  much  in  the  shape  of  a  subscription, 
he  could  manage  the  remainder  without  its  proving  detrimental  to 
his  private  property,  or  without  its  taking  more  of  his  income  than 
he  ought  to  spend  on  any  one  amusement ;  but,  on  looking  closely 
into  matters,  he  discovered  that  the  mastership  was  costing  him 
more  than  he  should  expend  on  such  an  object,  and  he  determined 
to  resign.  It  was,  however,  a  mistake  to  suppose  he  had  not  been 
properly  supported.  In  the  first  year  he  received  nearly  -£2000, 
and  in  the  next  he  found  himself  a  little  short;  but  then  it 
must  be  understood  that  there  was  no  one  to  collect  the  subscrip- 
tions, and,  independently  of  taking  charge  of  the  hounds,  he  had 
had  all  the  business  of  the  management  of  the  country  thrown 
upon  him.  He,  however,  had  a  full  knowledge  of  the  difficulties 
to  be  gone  through  to  obtain  subscriptions  when  he  took  office  ; 
but  the  expense  had  become  too  much  for  him,  and  the  bother 
of  the  country  and  the  coverts  was  too  much  for  any  one  man 
to  cope  with.  No  blame  attached  to  anybody,  for  he  took 
the  country  as  he  found  it,  but  discovered  it  was  too  much  for 
him.  It  had  been  insinuated  in  some  quarters  that  he  had  been 
badly  used;  but,  with  the  single  exception  of  a  half-witted  fellow 
who  lived  in  the  forest,  he  had  always  been  treated  well  by 
everybody.1 

1  In  January  of  1803,  just  before  Lord  Stamford's  period  of  mastership 
came  to  an  end,  and  about  the  time  that  Mr.  Clowes  made  his  offer  to  hunt 
the  country,  Mr.  W.  U.  Heygate,  M.P.,  offered  to  issue  some  circulars  with 
the  idea  of  urging  hunting  men  to  contribute  to  the  Hunt  funds,  so  as  to 
satisfy  Mr.  Clowes's  remarkably  modest  requirements.  Thereupon  "An  Old 
Fox-hunter"  wrote  to  the  Leicester  Journal  (16th  January  1863)  to  "plead 


MR.    CLOWES 


293 


Mr.  Clowes's  hounds  were  sold  at  the  Quorn  kennels, 
early  in  April  1866,  by  Messrs.  Tattersall,  and  fifty- 
seven  couples  were  put  up.  Lots  1-14  consisted  of 
four  couples  each,  and  lot  15  of  three  couples;  while 
there  were  six  lots  of  young  hounds  ;  and  the  total  sum 
realised  was  1401  guineas. 

the  cause  of  the  old  Quorn  hounds."  In  his  most  sensible  letter  he  remarked  : 
"  It  is  well  known  that  the  strangers  to  the  country,  who  annually  fill  Melton) 
&c,  would,  regardless  of  past  traditions,  gladly  see  the  old  Quorn  country 
broken  up  in  a  manner  more  convenient  for  themselves  ;  and  it  is  said  that 
this  district,  spoilt  by  the  liberality  of  the  present  and  past  masters  of  the 
Quorn,  is  actually  unable  to  raise  an  adequate  subscription  for  itself.  .  .  . 
There  are  many  whose  hands  the  circular  (Mr.  Heygate's)  will  never  reach, 
and  who  are  yet  most  interested  in  the  maintenance,  not  only  of  hounds,  but 
of  the  present  mode  of  hunting  the  old  Quorn  country.  Let  me  appeal  to 
these,  and  to  all  who  cling  to  past  associations,  to  lose  no  time  in  announcing 
their  wishes,  and,  let  me  also  add,  their  contributions." 


294  THE    QUORN    HUNT 


MARQUIS    OF    HASTINGS 

1866-1868 

WHAT  the  country  intended  to  do  with  respect  to 
a  new  master  does  not  appear  to  be  very  clear. 
Nobody  appears  to  have  offered  himself  for  the  post,  nor 
do  the  committee  seem  to  have  made  any  effort  to  dis- 
cover any  one  who  would  be  willing  to  fill  the  vacancy 
caused  by  the  retirement  of  Mr.  Clowes,  but  at  the  sale 
of  that  gentleman's  hounds  it  was  discovered  that  the 
Marquis  of  Hastings,  whose  name  was  well  known  in 
connection  with  the  turf,  had  bought  something  like 
twenty-eight  couples  of  the  best  hounds.  It  was  said 
that  he  bought  the  nucleus  of  his  pack  a  good  deal  better 
than  he  expected,  as  it  was  reported  that  he  had  given 
Mr.  Storey,  who  was  present  at  the  sale  on  his  behalf,  a 
commission  not  to  go  over  a  hundred  guineas  a  couple. 
But  it  appears  that  he  was  not  called  upon  to  pay  anything 
like  that  sum.  Lord  Curzon  and  Captain  Anstruther 
Thomson  bought  a  lot  apiece.  The  late  Lord  (then 
the  Hon.  R.  C.)  Hill  bought  some  for  Shropshire,  and 
some  went  to  the  Albrighton  country.  The  Marquis  of 
Hastings  at  any  rate  secured  a  sufficient  number  to  start 
hunting  with  ;  and  so  eager  was  he  to  begin  his  duties  as 
M.F.  H.  that  he  had  Macbride  and  the  hounds  out  at 
Grace  Dieu  on  the  Forest  on  the  morning  after  the  sale, 
and  finding  a  fox  had  a  capital  twenty-five  minutes  with 
him,  eventually  rolling  over  the  fox  in  the  open.  The 
new  master  was  also  a  purchaser  of  some  of  Mr.  Drake's 
hounds,  while  he  drew  as  well  upon  the  Bedale  and  South 


MARQUIS    OF    HASTINGS  295 

and  West  Wilts  kennels.  Between  the  Marquis  of  Hast- 
ings and  Mr.  Tailby  the  arrangement  was  that  the  former 
should  hunt  the  country  west  of  the  river  Wreake, 
and  that  he  should  also  include  the  old  Donington 
country.  For  some  time  there  had  been  a  difficulty  in 
connection  with  Walton  Thorns,  a  covert  which,  since 
the  doing  away  with  Munday's  Gorse,  had  never  main- 
tained its  previous  reputation.  It  would  appear  that 
Lord  Archibald  St.  Maur,  having  some  shooting  in  the 
vicinity  of  Walton  Thorns,  was  desirous  of  renting 
that  covert  and  some  land  near  it.  Lord  Archibald 
declared  that  if  he  obtained  the  shooting  he  would  pre- 
serve loxes  ;  but  that  if  he  were  denied  he  would  kill 
every  fox  coming  on  to  his  land  adjoining  the  covert. 
Meantime  the  owner  of  the  covert  declined  to  let  the 
right  of  shooting,  and  so  the  matter  stood  for  a  long 
time.  Who  the  owner  or  occupier  of  Walton  Thorns 
was  at  this  time  I  do  not  know,  but  it  is  on  record  that 

At  Walton  Thorns  there  were  plenty  of  foxes,  and  the  farmer's 
wife  informed  the  gentlemen  who  partook  of  her  bread  and  cheese 
that  she  had  been  a  fox-hunter  for  four-and-forty  years,  and  had 
given  luncheon  to  fifteen  masters  of  the  Quorn.1  As  for  the  cubs, 
she  said  they  might  eat  everything  off  the  farm  rather  than  she 
would  have  them  touched,  and  she  dashed  into  the  rides  with  her 
gown  up  to  her  armpits  when  the  hounds  were  drawing  to  watch 
the  "  new  man "  (presumably  Charles  Pike,  a  good  man  in  all 
respects,  who  remained  one  season  only  with  the  Marquis  of 
Hastings),  and  to  see  that  her  darlings  enjoyed  fair  play  at  his 
hands. 

Hunting  runs  rather  than  brilliant  bursts  appear  to 
have  characterised  the  Marquis  of  Hastings'  first  season. 

1  Ranking  the  Marquis  of  Hastings  as  one  of  the  fifteen,  the  old  lady's 
hospitality  must  have  extended  back  to  Mr.  Assheton  Smith,  if  we  regard 
Mr.  Osbaldeston  as  two  masters  by  virtue  of  his  having  been  master  twice. 
If  he  be  regarded  as  one  master  only,  the  fifteenth  would  be  Lord  Foley, 
who  gave  up  in  1807.  Forty-four  years  back  from  1867,  however,  would 
only  carry  us  back  to  1823,  the  year  in  which  the  Squire  entered  upon  his 
second  mastership  of  the  Quorn. 


296  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

In  December  1866  the  hounds  were  sometimes  out  five 
days  a  week,  and  in  one  week  three  of  the  days  were  on 
the  Donington  side. 

On  Monday  the  24th  December  there  was  found  a  fox  which  ran 
to  Belvoir;  on  Tuesday  they  were  running  "all  day  and  part  of 
the  night "  in  the  Donington  country ;  on  the  Wednesday  they  had 
what  was  up  to  that  date  the  run  of  the  season.  An  outlying  fox 
found  in  a  field  near  Breedon  Clouds  ran  thence  to  Congerston 
Gorse,  near  Gopsall,  the  line  being  over  the  Atherstone  country. 
On  Thursday  Lord  Stamford's  woods  near  Bradgate  gave  the 
hounds  a  fox  which  was  not  pulled  down  till  he  had  stood  before 
them  for  upwards  of  two  hours ;  then  came  an  evening  gallop,  and 
there  was  at  any  rate  decent  sport  on  the  Friday.  On  the  nth 
January  (Friday)  1867  a  hard  frost  threatened  to  stop  hunting, 
but  after  waiting  for  some  time  a  beginning  was  made,  and  after 
Gartree  Hill  had  been  drawn  blank  some  one  turned  down  a  bag 
fox  near  Sir  F.  Burdett's  covert,  so  the  master  caused  the  hounds 
to  be  stopped  and  taken  away  to  Thorpe  Trussells.  A  fox  was 
soon  found  near  the  road,  and  hounds  ran  him  at  quite  a  fair  pace 
towards  Great  Dalby,  and  then  to  the  right  undei  Burrough  Hill, 
leaving  the  village  on  the  left.  A  second  fox  which  was  viewed 
running  parallel  to  the  line  of  the  first  might  have  complicated 
matters  somewhat,  but  the  pack  stuck  to  the  line  of  the  hunted 
fox.  Leaving  Twyford  on  the  right  the  brook  came  in  sight,  and 
as  hounds  were  then  running  at  a  good  pace,  a  few  only  cared  to 
turn  away  for  the  bridge  ;  but  the  water  claimed  several  victims, 
while  those  who  did  get  across  were  not  very  well  pleased  at  dis- 
covering that  the  fox  had  gone  back,  so  that  the  brook  had  to  be 
jumped  again.  Eventually,  after  running  near  Lowesby  (Mr.  Tailby 
leading  the  way),  up  the  Newton  Hills,  to  the  left  of  the  Coplow 
and  Billesdon,  hounds  ran  tolerably  fast  to  Skeffington,  nearly  up 
to  Mr.  Tailby 's  house;  the  fox  was  killed  in  the  kitchen  garden  at 
Loddington  Hall,  after  a  run  of  an  hour  and  forty  minutes. 

In  February  1867  the  first  whipper-in  (Philip  Tocock) 
had  to  go  home  in  consequence  of  a  bad  fall,  and  was 
not  out  again  for  a  week.  On  the  first  day  on  which 
he  was  able  to  appear,  Stephen  Winkworth,  the  second 
whipper-in,  broke  his  collar-bone,  and  then  during  March 


MARQUIS    OF    HASTINGS  297 

there  was  so  much  frost,  accompanied  by  easterly  winds, 
that  hunting  was  a  orood  deal  interfered  with. 

On  February  4th  the  Belvoir  met  at  Hose  Grange, 
and  finding  in  the  gorse,  enjoyed  a  capital  twenty 
minutes'  gallop  wherewith  to  begin  the  day.  Near 
to  the  New  Covert  the  Ouorn,  who  had  brought  a 
fox  from  Lodge-on-the- Wolds,  were  in  sight,  but  they, 
on  seeing  the  Belvoir,  retired  within  their  own  boun- 
daries. The  Belvoir  found  their  next  fox  at  the  Old 
Hills,  and  getting  well  away  drove  him  past  Scalford  ; 
but  after  running  for  about  a  quarter  of  an  hour  they 
again  met  the  Ouorn,  who  had  run  a  fox  from  Grimston 
Gorse,  and  by  some  accident  the  two  lines  crossed,  both 
packs  getting  on  to  the  same  fox,  and  for  ten  minutes 
they  ran  hard  in  the  direction  of  Piper  Hole,  killing  their 
fox  by  Goadby  Fishpond.  Both  huntsmen  of  course 
claimed  the  fox,  but  one  of  the  Belvoir  whippers-in  was 
the  first  to  handle  him  ;  the  joint  packs  then  broke  him 
up,  and  separated  for  home. 

On  the  1 6th  of  that  month  the  Belvoir  and  Mr. 
Tailby's  were  close  to  one  another,  but  did  not  clash  ; 
on  this  occasion  neither  huntsman  brought  his  fox  to 
hand. 

The  run  of  the  season  1866-67,  however,  may  be 
said  to  have  taken  place  on  the  6th  April,  when  the 
Ouorn  met  at  Wimeswold. 

Willoughby  Gorse  and  some  of  the  Widmerpool  coverts  were 
blank,  and  it  was  not  until  the  afternoon  that  the  field  found  them- 
selves at  Walton  Thorns  (a  covert  above  alluded  to  in  connection 
with  Lord  Archibald  St.  Maur's  shooting).  In  the  Thorns,  how- 
ever, they  found  a  bob-tailed  fox  which  had  already  twice  tried 
conclusions  with  Pike,  the  huntsman,  and  his  hounds,  and  away 
this  fox  went  in  the  direction  of  Seagrave.  At  a  merry  pace  the 
hounds  ran  on  nearly  to  Cossington  Gorse  ;  then  turning  to  the 
left  and  running  by  Thrussington,  Hoby,  Asfordby,  and  then 
some  distance  further  on,  the  fox  was  rolled  over  close  to  Old 
Hills  in  the   Belvoir  country.     The  distance  from   point  to  point 


298  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

was  called  over  nine  miles,  while  hounds  are  said  to  have  run 
about  fourteen ;  but  there  is  probably  a  mistake  somewhere, 
seeing  that  the  time  is  given  as  an  hour  and  ten  minutes  only. 
From  start  to  finish  the  hounds  were  never  once  cast  or  interfered 
with,  and  as  the  run  lay  over  a  stiff  line,  falls  were  numerous ; 
but  happily  there  was  but  one  accident,  and  that  happened  to 
Captain  King,  who  broke  his  collar-bone. 

Towards  the  close  of  the  season  1866-67,  while  the 
weather  was  very  wet,  the  Quorn  had  a  somewhat 
notable  run.  On  Monday  the  nth  February  1867  tne 
hounds  met  at  Six  Hills. 

They  first  drew  Cossington  Gorse,  where  they  found  at  once, 
the  fox,  after  showing  himself  once  or  twice,  going  away  in  view 
of  most  of  the  field.  The  hounds  were  not  far  behind  him ;  and 
in  the  direction  of  Thrussington  and  Hoby  they  ran  nicely  for 
about  fifteen  minutes,  when  they  checked ;  but,  hitting  off  the  line 
by  themselves,  ran  rather  slower  than  at  first  almost  to  Schoby 
Scholes,  where  they  checked  again.  A  countryman,  however,  had 
viewed  the  fox  into  the  gorse,  whence  the  hounds  soon  forced  him, 
but  whether  he  was  the  hunted  fox  is  uncertain.  At  any  rate 
hounds  drove  along  to  Grimston  Gorse,  through  it,  and  then  over 
the  well-known  line  by  Wartnaby  Stone-pits  and  Little  Belvoir. 
On  more  than  one  occasion  the  chances  of  a  run  were  in  danger 
of  being  spoiled  through  fresh  foxes  jumping  up ;  but  Pike  held 
his  hounds  to  the  hunted  fox  past  Holwell  Mouth  and  Clawson 
Thorns,  along  the  hillside  through  the  Piper  Hole  Gorses  nearly 
to  Strattern  Point.  There  the  fox,  quite  beat,  lay  down,  and  was 
run  into  after  a  good  hunting  run  of  about  a  couple  of  hours.  It 
was  tolerably  straight,  and  perhaps  about  fourteen  miles  from 
point   to  point.1 

In  June  1867,  and  consequently  during  the  master- 
ship of  the  Marquis  of  Hastings,  a  horse  and  hound 
show  was  held  at  Bingley  Hall,  Birmingham.  Some 
roomy  temporary  kennels  had  been  put  up  for  the 
hounds,  and  the  judging-ring,  about  40  by  30  feet,  was 
boarded    instead    of    flagged.       The    judges    were    Mr. 

1  Sir  Richard  Sutton  had  a  somewhat  similar  run  ;  but  his  fox,  which  was 
killed  at  Denton,  took  him  rather  more  to  the  right. 


MARQUIS    OF    HASTINGS  299 

Cornelius  Tongue,  who  wrote  as  "  Cecil,"  and  John 
Walker,  who  had  left  Sir  Watkin  Wynn  two  years 
previously  ;  and  they  gave  first  prize  to  three  couples 
of  the  Ouorn  bitches — 

Dainty,  5  years,  by  Quorn  Albert — Ouorn  Dainty ;  Harriet 
and  Heroine,  4  years,  by  Worcestershire  Sportsman — Quorn 
Honesty ;  Needful,  3  years,  by  Drake's  Castor  —  his  Needful  ; 
Music,  3  years,  by  Quorn  Marmion — Quorn  Niobe  ;  Violet,  by 
Lord  Yarborough's  Freeman — his  Violet. 

I  have  found  a  note  about  this  show  to  the  effect 
that  the  Quorn  three  couples  were  "  a  nice  level  lot, 
without  any  pretensions  to  extraordinary  symmetry." 
To-day  they  would  perhaps  hardly  be  up  to  Peter- 
borough form. 

This  Birmingham  hound-show  appears  to  have  been 
conducted  upon  altogether  new  lines.  Some  clever 
person  took  it  into  his  head  that  the  public  would  be 
attracted  and  amused  if  all  the  hounds  were  mixed  up 
together  into  one  big  pack,  and  paraded  in  the  ring  by 
a  huntsman  and  two  whippers-in,  mounted  on  horses 
which  had  taken  prizes ;  and,  strangely  enough,  this 
queer  suggestion  commended  itself  to  the  executive.  To 
the  huntsman  of  the  Quorn  fell  the  dubious  honour  of 
playing  the  principal  part  in  this  comedy.  He  by  no 
means  appreciated  the  distinction,  for  he  was  perfectly 
well  aware  that  a  show-hunter  was  not  synonymous  with 
a  hunter  warranted  not  to  kick  hounds,  and  knew  that  in 
the  event  of  his  mount  kicking,  one  of  his  own  hounds 
would  be  the  probable  victim,  as  they  would  actually  be 
nearest  to  him.  Shortly  before  the  parade  the  hounds 
were  fed  to  order  of  the  authorities — the  reader  may 
guess  the  sequel  :  the  arena  was  promptly  cleared. 

The  Marquis  of  Hastings'  second  and  last  season 
was  not  productive  of  good  sport.  Pike,  who  had 
proved  himself   a   very  capable   huntsman    in    1866-67, 


300  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

left,  and  was  replaced  by  Thomas  Wilson  ;  while  both 
whippers-in  were  changed.  In  the  autumn  of  1867  the 
Marquis  of  Hastings  removed  the  kennels  to  Donington 
for  reasons  which  no  doubt  seemed  good  to  him,  but 
which  were  not  quite  understood  by  the  Quorn  hunting- 
men. 

In  December  1867,  after  some  bad  weather,  the 
hounds  met  at  Barkby,  and  found  in  the  Holt  after 
being  for  a  long  time  in  covert.  The  fox  went  away  at 
the  lower  side,  and  after  the  hounds  had  been  running 
for  about  five  minutes,  Lord  Charles  Ker  broke  his  leg 
through  his  horse  falling  in  a  lane  ;  while  only  a  little 
further  on  the  second  whipper-in  was  considerably  in- 
jured by  his  horse  falling  with  him,  neither  accident 
having  occurred  at  a  fence.  Barkby  Holt,  indeed,  es- 
tablished a  character  for  being  unlucky,  as  during  the 
season  two  more  good  sportsmen  broke  their  legs  near 
this  covert. 

About  Christmas  time  it  became  known  that  the 
Marquis  of  Hastings  would  give  up  the  country  at  the 
end  of  the  season.  So  many  lives  of  the  marquis  have 
been  written  at  different  times,  and  he  has  been  the 
subject  of  so  much  blame  and  obloquy,  that  one  naturally 
is  unwilling  to  add  to  the  disparaging  remarks  already 
made  ;  but  in  attempting  an  outline  history  of  the 
famous  Ouorn  Hunt  it  is  impossible  to  avoid  saying 
that  as  a  master  he  was  not  a  success.  He  had  no  real 
love  for  hunting,  and  he  was  busied  with  racing-  matters. 
Punctuality,  alas !  he  never  thought  of,  and  it  was  no 
uncommon  occurrence  for  him  to  keep  the  field  waiting 
an  unconscionable  time  before  he  arrived,  and  then 
he  would  often  leave  the  hounds  early  to  go  off  to  some 
race-meeting. 

On  one  occasion  Mr.  Sothern,  the  actor,  who  when 
playing  at  Birmingham  never  missed  an  opportunity  of 
hunting  with  any  pack  within  reach,  once  took  a  horse 


MARQUIS    OF    HASTINGS  301 

down  from  London  to  have  a  day  with  the  Marquis  of 
Hastings.  The  advertised  time  (it  was  late  in  March)  was 
twelve  o'clock,  but  the  master  did  not  reach  the  covert- 
side  until  after  one  o'clock  ;  and  then  he  and  some  friends 
went  inside  Barkby  Hall,  where  they  remained  until  half- 
past.  This  delay  of  course  cut  the  day  very  short,  and 
after  a  fox  had  been  found  at  Barkby  Holt,  and  had  run 
by  South  Croxton  to  Baggrave,  Mr.  Sothern  had  to 
leave  the  hounds  in  order  to  catch  the  train  at  Leicester, 
to  reach  London  in  time  to  appear  the  same  evening  at 
the  Haymarket.  He  was  greatly  annoyed  at  obtaining 
so  little  fun  for  his  money  ;  but  these  long  waits  were 
unfortunately  too  common. 

On  the  Marquis  of  Hastings  giving  up  the  country, 
the  hounds  and  horses  were  sold  at  the  kennels  on  the 
2nd  May  1868.  Masters  of  hounds  were  well  repre- 
sented, Lord  Coventry,  Lord  Rendlesham,  Lord  Henry 
Bentinck,  Lord  Macclesfield,  Colonel  Anstruther  Thom- 
son, Mr.  Hugo  Meynell  Ingram,  Mr.  Harvey  Bayly, 
Mr.  Drake,  Colonel  Jardine  (from  Forfarshire),  Messrs. 
Vernon,  Allsopp,  Mr.  Francklin  (who  laid  the  foundation 
of  his  new  pack),  the  Hon.  R.  Nevill,  and  Mr.  Henley 
Greaves  being  among  those  present,  and  some  of  them 
bought  either  hounds  or  horses.  Among  the  assembly 
of  huntsmen  was  old  Tom  Day,  who  was  still  living  at 
Quorn,  and  who  informed  his  friends  that  this  was  the 
seventh  sale  of  the  Ouorn  hounds  at  which  he  had 
been  present ;  so  often  had  they  been  dispersed.  In  the 
paddock  adjoining  the  kennels  a  rostrum  was  erected  for 
Mr.  Pain  of  Tattersall's,  who  conducted  the  sale.  The 
Marquis  and  Marchioness  of  Hastings  were  present,  and 
the  hounds,  which  were  sold  in  thirty  lots,  realised  1057 
guineas,  twenty-nine  hunters  bringing  3098  guineas. 


302  THE    QUORN    HUNT 


MR.    JOHN    CHAWORTH    MUSTERS 

1868-1870 

AT  the  time  of  the  Marquis  of  Hastings  giving  up 
the  Ouorn  hounds,  which  was  by  no  means  an 
unexpected  event,  Mr.  J.  C.  Musters  (grandson  of  the 
famous  Jack  Musters)  was  hunting  the  South  Notts 
country,  of  which  two  members  of  his  family  had  already 
been  masters.  He  in  fact  resuscitated  the  old  South 
Notts  country,  and  laid  the  foundation  of  his  pack  with 
four  couples  of  Mr.  Drake's  hounds,  for  which  he  gave 
220  guineas.  He  obtained  some  other  drafts  from  other 
good  kennels,  and  appointed  Ben  Boothroyd  as  kennel 
huntsman.  Then  in  1868  he  handed  over  the  South 
Notts  country  to  Mr.  Francklin,  and  when  the  Ouorn 
were  in  rather  a  difficulty  for  a  new  master,  he  stepped 
forward  and  became  the  Marquis  of  Hastings'  successor, 
bringing  with  him  a  very  excellent  and  clever  pack  of 
hounds  ;  and,  what  is  more,  he  took  the  expensive 
Leicestershire  country  without  a  subscription. 

Mr.  Musters  was  born  in  1838,  and  on  leaving  Eton 
went  to  Christ  Church,  Oxford,  where  in  1857  he  began 
to  keep  a  pack  of  beagles  and  hunted  with  the  Bicester. 
He  left  Oxford  early  and  then  took  to  hunting  his  own 
country,  his  first  hounds  being  bought  of  Mr.  Ambrose 
Philips.  He  killed  his  first  fox  on  November  30,  1861, 
after  a  good  forty  minutes'  run,  near  his  own  residence, 
Annesley  Park. 

Mr.  Musters  had  scarcely  settled  down  in  his  new 
position  ere  he  lost  his  first  whipper-in  through  a  some- 


MR.    JOHN    CHAWORTH    MUSTERS     303 

what  curious  accident.  He  and  Frank  Gillard,  who  came 
with  him  from  South  Notts,  divided  the  hunting  between 
them  at  Ouorn,  and  on  one  day  Gillard  took  the  young 
hounds  into  Garendon  Park  for  the  purpose  of  making 
them  steady  from  deer.  When  returning  over  the  park 
on  the  way  home,  Roger  Onions,  the  first  whipper-in, 
saw  a  lame  deer,  towards  which  the  hounds  were  trotted. 
When  the  pack  approached  it,  Onions  started  at  a  canter 
in  order  to  turn  the  deer  in  front  of  the  hounds.  Un- 
luckily, however,  his  horse  and  the  deer  came  into 
collision,  and  he  thereupon  fell  to  the  ground.  He  was 
rescued  as  soon  as  possible,  but  died  within  ten  hours  of 
the  accident,  without  ever  again  becomina-  conscious,  and 
what  made  matters  all  the  worse  was  that  he  left  a  young 
widow  and  three  children  totally  unprovided  for.  A 
subscription  was  at  once  set  on  foot  for  the  benefit  of 
his  family,  and  Mr.  Musters  headed  the  list  with  a  ten- 
pound  donation.  At  the  inquest  Gillard  stated  that, 
seeing  the  deer  and  the  horse  were  likely  to  collide,  he 
called  to  Onions  to  stop,  but  the  deceased  did  not  appear 
to  hear  him.  After  the  fall  the  deer  got  up  and  ran 
away,  but  the  whipper-in  was  left  on  the  ground  with 
his  left  leg  under  the  horse  for  a  few  seconds.  On  the 
horse  getting  up,  the  unfortunate  man's  foot  remaining 
in  the  stirrup,  he  was  dragged,  but  only  for  a  few  yards. 
On  being  liberated  he  was  raised  up,  but  was  insensible, 
and  he  died  about  six  o'clock  in  the  evening.  A  verdict 
of  accidental  death  was  returned.  John  Goddard,  jun., 
was  second  whipper-in  at  the  time. 

It  cannot  be  said  that  Mr.  Musters's  first  season 
opened  very  joyously,  for  in  November  his  predecessor, 
the  Marquis  of  Hastings,  died,  and  about  the  same  time 
Lord  Somerville  was  killed  while  hunting  with  Mr. 
Tailby. 

Contrary  to  general  custom,  politics  about  this  time 
found   their  way  into    the    hunting-field.      Mr.    Clowes, 


304  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

who  had  been  master  before  Lord  Hastings,  courted  the 
suffrages  of  the  voters  of  North  Leicestershire  as  their 
member,  whereupon  his  opponent,  Mr.  C.  H.  Frewen, 
wrote  a  letter  to  the  Duke  of  Rutland  to  the  effect  that  it 
was  always  best  to  be  straightforward  in  all  matters,  and 
he  added  : — 

I  do  not  think  that  Mr.  Clowes's  prospects  of  success  in  North 
Leicestershire  are  very  encouraging,  but  there  is  a  decided  feeling 
with  many  that  if  he  should  be  dragged  in  to  represent  the  fox- 
hunting interest,  why,  then  the  sooner  fox-hunting  is  put  an  end 
to  the  better  ;  and  if  it  should  so  happen  that  he  gets  in,  some  of 
us  intend  to  do  our  best  to  clear  the  country  of  foxes,  which  can 
very  easily  be  done.  When  poor  men  have  been  turned  out  of 
their  land  because  they  dared  to  vote  for  me  in  1865,  we  shall  be 
quite  justified  in  taking  this  course.  A  gentleman  of  large  landed 
property  in  the  county  said  to  me  only  on  Saturday  "that  it  was 
monstrous  bringing  forward  a  man  who  had  no  property  in  the 
county,  and  who  had  only  been  here  a  few  years  as  a  fox-hunter, 
and  who  was  shortly  going  to  leave  the  county." 

I  have  written  in  the  same  tone  to  Mr.  Tailby  and  Colonel 
Lowther,  in  order  that  they  may  know  what  our  intentions  are ; 
and  if  such  a  state  of  things  should  be  brought  about,  the  fox- 
hunters  will  then  have  nothing  to  complain  of,  as  they  will  have 
been  informed  beforehand  what  our  intentions  were. 

(Signed)         C.   H.   FREWEN. 

If  there  was  any  great  difference  in  our  political  opinions,  or  if 
Mr.  Clowes  was  an  owner  of  property  in  the  county,  things  would 
be  very  different.  The  Conservatives  in  this  county  have  lost 
two  seats  through  their  own  foolish  conduct — the  Borough  of 
Leicester  and  South  Leicestershire — both  of  which  they  had  pre- 
vious to  the  election  in  1865,  and  if  they  lose  any  more  seats  they 
will  onlv  have  to  thank  themselves  for  it. 

To  this  the  duke  returned  an  answer  that  he  failed 
to  see  what  possible  bearing  the  return  of  either  Mr. 
Frewen  or  Mr.  Clowes  would  have  on  the  subject  of 
hunting,  while  he  further  challenged  Mr.  Frewen's  state- 
ment that  poor  men  had  been  turned  out  of   their  homes 


THE    MEETING. — KIRBY    GATE.        DRAWN     BY     H.    ALKEN. 


Holt.  Quonhv  H.itl. 


BREAKING    COVER. —  BILLESDON    COPLOW.       DRAWN     BY    H.    ALKEN. 


MR.    JOHN    CHAWORTH    MUSTERS      305 

because  on  a  previous  occasion  they  had  voted  for  him 
(Mr.  Frewen).  The  duke  added  that  he  should  very- 
much  like  to  have  the  name  and  address  of  any  person 
who  had  been  so  treated. 

Frank  Gillard,  who  hunted  for  him  (Mr.  Musters)  in 
Leicestershire,  and  afterwards  became  the  famous  hunts- 
man of  the  Belvoir,  had  a  long  career  with  hounds.1 

Mr.  Musters's  first  season  chanced  to  be  a  very  good 
scenting  one,  consequently  a  great  deal  of  excellent  sport 
was  enjoyed. 

Mr.  Storey  of  Lockington,  when  the  subject  of  the 
Quorn  sport  was  raised,  used  chaffingly  to  say  that  if 
Mr.  Musters  could  not  show  sport  he  did  not  know  who 
could,  seeing  that  he  had  three  huntsmen  on  his  establish- 
ment ;  he  himself  was  one,  Frank  Gillard  was  another, 
and  John  Machin,2  who  had  formerly  hunted  the  Rufford, 

1  In  1857  he  was  huntsman  and  whipper-in  to  Captain  Willett's  harriers, 
the  captain  hunting  a  country  round  Monkleigh,  in  North  Devon  ;  but  after 
two  years'  experience  of  hare-hunting  (that  is  to  say,  in  1859)  he  became 
second  whip  to  the  Hon.  Mark  Rolle,  and  then  came  to  the  Belvoir  as  second 
whipper-in.  In  1863  he  became  first  whipper-in,  James  Cooper  being  the 
huntsman,  and  in  1867  Gillard  left  Rutlandshire  to  go  to  Mr.  Musters,  who 
was  then  hunting  the  South  Notts  country,  succeeding  Ben  Boothroyd  as 
first  whipper-in  and  kennel  huntsman.  When  Mr.  Musters  took  the  Quorn 
in  1868,  Gillard  went  with  him,  and  hunted  the  bitch  pack  two  days  a  week 
on  the  Melton  side,  the  master  taking  the  forest  side  on  the  other  two  days 
with  the  dog  hounds.  Gillard  then  hunted  for  a  short  time  under  Mr.  Coup- 
land,  but  almost  before  he  had  settled  down  the  Belvoir  were  in  want  of  a 
huntsman,  so  the  Duke  of  Rutland  offered  him  the  place,  as  he  had  made 
his  mark  when  whipping-in  to  that  pack.  There  was  necessarily  some 
difficulty  about  terminating  his  engagement  with  Mr.  Coupland,  but  that 
gentleman,  on  being  appealed  to  by  the  duke,  at  once  released  Gillard,  who 
hunted  the  pack  from  that  time  down  to  1896,  when  Sir  Gilbert  Greenall 
became  master,  and  engaged  Ben  Capell,  from  the  Blankney,  as  huntsman. 

2  John  Machin,  in  his  best  days  a  first-class  horseman,  went  in  1861  to 
the  Rufford  as  first  whipper-in,  and  he  subsequently  became  huntsman  ; 
but  leaving  there  in  1868  he  was  first  whipper-in  to  the  Quorn  under  Mr. 
Musters,  and  there  he  stayed  two  seasons,  his  successor  being  Thomas 
Wiggins.  His  next  place  was  as  huntsman  to  the  Ticklam  foxhounds  up 
to  1872,  from  which  date  he  discharged  the  same  duty  in  connection  with 
the  Pytchley  for  three  years.  Machin  then  set  up  as  a  horse-breaker,  and 
for  a  time  was  very  successful,  for  he  had  a  good  stock  of  patience  and  fine 
hands.     The  year  1878  saw  him  again  with  hounds — as  huntsman  to  the 

U 


306  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

was  first  whipper-in,  while  John  Goddard,  after  hunting 
the  Ouorn  and  Mr.  Tailby's  hounds,  engaged  himself 
to  Mr.  Musters  as  stud-groom  ;  so  there  was  certainly 
plenty  of  science  and  talent  in  the  kennel.1 

At  that  time  there  was  no  better  hunting  man  in 
Leicestershire  than  Lord  Wilton,  and  towards  the  end 
of  Mr.  Musters's  first  season,  that  is  to  say,  in  March 
1869,  Lord  Wilton,  while  hunting  with  the  Belvoir, 
rode  at  a  small  fence,  and  his  horse  overjumping  himself 
came  down,  and  rising  at  once  ran  down  a  steep  bank. 
His  rider,  who  had  not  lost  his  seat,  though  he  was 
minus  a  stirrup,  did  his  best  to  steady  his  hunter,  but 
he  overbalanced  himself  and  came  down  very  heavily 
upon  the  ground,  breaking  his  left  arm,  and  also  a 
rib.  This  unfortunate  contretemps  to  one  of  the  best 
horsemen  in  Leicestershire  naturally  cast  something 
of  a  gloom  over  Melton  Mowbray  and  its  neighbour- 
hood. 

Taking  the  season  through,  it  was  felt  that  in  the 
hands  of  Mr.  Musters  much  had   been  accomplished  to 

Lamerton  hounds.  On  a  change  of  mastership  taking  place  Machin  left, 
and  once  more  devoted  himself  to  horse-breaking  until  1885,  when  he  was 
made  huntsman  to  the  Anglesey  harriers  ;  but  sustaining  a  bad  fall  in  his 
third  season,  he  injured  his  spine  ;  his  brain  became  affected,  and  he  died 
in  an  asylum  after  a  year's  confinement  therein. 

1  John  Goddard  began  his  hunting  career  as  second  whipper-in  to  the 
Heythrop  under  Jem  Hills  when  Lord  Redesdale  was  the  ruling  spirit  of 
the  Hunt,  which  has  for  so  many  years  been  in  the  able  hands  of  Mr.  Albert 
Brassey.  In  185 1  he  became  landlord  of  the  White  Hart,  Chipping  Norton, 
but  after  a  five  years'  tenure  he  left  that  house,  and  went  to  hunt  the  Shrop- 
shire for  one  season  under  Mr.  Morris,  and  then  he  was  engaged  by  Mr. 
Tailby,  whom  he  served  for  seven  seasons.  Leaving  that  gentleman  in  1863, 
he  hunted  the  Quorn  for  three  years  under  Mr.  Clowes,  and  after  one  season 
with  the  Hon.  W.  H.  J.  North  (afterwards  Lord  North),  of  the  Bicester,  he 
gave  up  hunting  in  consequence  of  the  hold  rheumatism  had  of  him.  He 
then,  as  above  mentioned,  became  stud-groom  to  Mr.  Musters,  and  no  man 
could  have  been  better  fitted  for  the  post,  as  he  was  a  brilliant  horse- 
man, a  capital  stableman,  and  was  possessed  of  a  good  deal  of  veterinary 
knowledge.  When  Mr.  Musters  gave  up  his  hounds,  John  Goddard,  who 
had  three  sons  who  served  with  hounds,  went  into  retirement,  living  at 
Lowdham,  near  Nottingham,  where  he  died  rather  suddenly  on  the  14th 
August  1880. 


MR.    JOHN    CHAWORTH    MUSTERS      307 

efface  the  memory  of  the  past  two  seasons.  Mr.  Musters 
was  nothing  if  not  thorough,  and  in  place  of  the  very 
casual  system  which  had  been  in  vogue  in  the  late 
marquis's  time,  punctuality,  order,  and  strict  attention 
to  detail  reigned  supreme  ;  while  those  who  had  been 
accustomed  to  ride  rough-shod  over  the  hounds,  and 
do  all  manner  of  things  that  they  ought  not  to  do, 
were  very  much  kept  in  order  by  Mr.  Musters,  who 
never  hesitated  when  necessary  to  strongly  enforce  his 
claims. 

Mr.  Ernest  Chaplin,  of  Brooksby  Hall,  assisted  by 
a  practical  farmer,  Mr.  Thomas  Wright,  managed  the 
coverts,  so  it  was  no  wonder  that  matters  in  connection 
with  the  Ouorn  Hunt  showed  a  great  improvement. 
There  were,  of  course,  some  bad  days  ;  but  as  a  kind 
of  foretaste  of  what  was  to  come,  the  Ouorn  had  a  really 
brilliant  run  during  cub-hunting  from  Crosley  Spinneys, 
a  place  not  far  from  Leicester.  Hounds  ran  hard  by 
the  town,  and  killed  near  Glenfield.  The  first  twenty 
minutes  was  at  racing  pace,  and  then  came  rather  steady 
hunting  to  the  finish  of  the  run.  Since  then  many  good 
runs  were  brought  off,  and  the  Melton  brigade  made 
no  complaint,  while  the  Market  Harborough  division 
took  every  opportunity  of  joining  Mr.  Musters,  to  par- 
ticipate in  the  many  good  things  which  came  off.  The 
November  of  1868  brought  with  it  a  lack  of  scent,  but 
in  December  things  improved,  and  several  good  runs 
came  off. 

Although  Mr.  Musters  rode  between  seventeen  and 
eighteen  stone,  his  weight  never  stopped  him,  for  he 
rode  well  up  to  his  hounds,  while  Lord  Wilton  (then 
nearly  seventy  years  of  age)  went  most  brilliantly  all  the 
season  through  up  to  the  time  of  his  accident.  Mr. 
Burbidge,  too,  another  veteran,  was  always  prominent 
in  every  good  run,  and  Lord  Calthorpe,  Lord  Royston, 
Sir  Frederick  Johnstone,   and   Mr.  Chaplin,  one  and  all 


308  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

served   to   keep  up  the  reputation    of  Leicestershire  as 
the  home  of  hard  riders. 

Melton  itself  was  extremely  full  of  visitors,  and  the 
principal  studs  were  very  strong ;  but,  as  a  chronicler 
of  the  time  wrote — 

A  swell  of  the  first  water  at  Melton  is  not  supposed  to  know 
how  many  horses  he  possesses.  There  were,  however,  about 
twenty-five  to  the  credit  of  Lord  Wilton,  Mr.  Little  Gilmour 
owned  half  a  score,  Mr.  Crawfurd  sixteen,  Messrs.  Behrens 
thirty-five,  Messrs.  Coupland  twenty-five,  Major  Paynter  ten,  Mr. 
Westley  Richards  thirty,  Sir  Frederick  Johnstone  twenty,  Lord 
Calthorpe  sixteen,  and  Lord  Royston  thirteen,  besides  many 
others  which  fall  just  short  of  double  figures. 

But  in  spite  of  all  this  preparation  for  the  chase 
there  was  a  scarcity  of  foxes  in  some  places. 

A  pleasant  incident  of  the  opening  day  of  Mr. 
Musters 's  second  season  at  Kirby  Gate  was  the  presenta- 
tion to  him  of  a  whip,  on  the  part  of  the  earth-stoppers 
of  his  country,  in  acknowledgment  of  his  liberal  treat- 
ment of  them.  Sport  was  rather  poor,  but  the  good- 
will of  the  earth-stoppers  was  worth  a  great  deal.  The 
reason  given  for  the  scarcity  of  foxes  was  the  increase 
of  game-preserving  in  the  country,  and  on  Charnwood 
Forest  especially.  The  fox-preserving  question  was 
evidently  a  serious  one,  for  in  December  1869  a  meet- 
ing of  the  members  of  the  Ouorn  Hunt  was  held  at 
the  County  Club  at  Leicester,  Mr.  Clowes  (then  M.P.) 
in  the  chair.  After  passing  a  cordial  vote  of  thanks  to 
Mr.  Musters  for  the  manner  in  which  he  hunted  the 
country,  it  was  determined  that  every  effort  should  be 
made  to  induce  the  owners  and  occupiers  of  land  and 
coverts  to  preserve  foxes,  and,  while  they  were  about 
it,  to  take  down  the  wire  which  in  some  parts  of  the 
country  was  such  an  annoyance. 

Among  the  May  meetings  which  took  place  in  1869 


MR.   JOHN    CHAWORTH    MUSTERS     309 

Was  one  of  the  London  Farmers'  Club,  when  a  paper 
Was  read  on  the  use  and  abuse  of  fox-hunting,  by  the 
Rev.  E.  Smithies,  of  Hathern  Rectory. 

He  occupied,  he  said,  about  three  hundred  acres  of  land,  a 
large  portion  of  which  ran  by  one  of  the  best  coverts  of  the  Quorn 
Hunt.  Hounds  often  met  at  this  place,  found  a  fox  three  times 
out  of  four,  and  invariably  crossed  his  land.  He  frequently, 
therefore,  had  the  pleasure  of  seeing  three  hundred  or  six  hundred 
persons  ride  across  the  ploughed  fields,  and  no  matter  whether 
the  crops  were  wheat,  clover,  or  peas,  away  they  went,  all  up 
wind,  and  he  confessed  that  he  frequently  stood  by  with  very 
mixed  feelings  on  the  national  pastime.  The  country  gentleman 
who  had  a  stake  in  the  country  went  over  the  grass  ;  he  was  gene- 
rally a  good  sportsman,  and  did  comparatively  little  injury;  but 
the  rich  brewer  from  Melton,  the  cotton  lord  from  Manchester, 
the  cloth  lord  from  Leeds,  and  the  iron  lord  from  Wolverhampton, 
these  were  the  men  who  did  not  care  what  injury  they  did.  He 
said  he  knew  opinions  were  divided  as  to  whether  crops  suffered 
from  being  ridden  over,  but  he  was  inclined  to  think  that  those 
who  were  of  opinion  that  no  harm  was  done  farmed  light  land, 
and  those  who  came  to  the  opposite  conclusion  farmed  heavy  clay 
land.  He  said  that  he  was  able  to  show  in  two  or  three  of  his 
fields  of  wheat  at  least  a  thousand  prints  of  horses'  hoofs,  and 
he  would  almost  go  so  far  as  to  say  he  would  offer  any  gentleman 
who  thought  no  injury  was  done  thereby  a  sovereign  for  every 
blade  he  could  find  in  the  footprints.  If,  however,  it  was  really 
a  good  thing  to  have  one's  crops  ridden  over  he  would  rather  ride 
over  his  own,  so  that  he  could  do  it  regularly. 

There  is  nothing  new  under  the  sun  ;  for  the  argu- 
ments which  are  advanced  against  hunting  to-day  were 
used  upwards  of  a  hundred  years  ago. 

The  mastership,  however,  which  began  amidst  such 
pleasant  promises  was  soon  destined  to  come  to  an  end. 
Towards  the  close  of  his  second  season  Mr.  Musters's 
health  showed  signs  of  giving  way,  while  at  the  same 
time  the  strain  upon  his  purse  was  greater  than  he  could 
afford.  Like  the  good  sportsman  he  was,  he  could  never 
bring  himself  to  hunt  the  Quorn  country  in  parsimonious 


310  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

fashion,  and  so  when  he  found  that  his  health  and  his 
purse  were  alike  unequal  to  the  demands  made  upon 
them  respectively,  he  had  no  alternative  but  to  announce 
his  determination  to  resign,  intelligence,  it  is  needless 
to  say,  which  was  received  with  extreme  regret,  and 
the  country  at  once  hoped  that  he  would  reconsider 
his  decision  and  accept  a  subscription.  This,  however, 
he  did  not  see  his  way  to  do,  at  least  not  to  the  full 
extent  to  which  his  followers  wished,  but  he  made  a 
proposal  to  which  reference  will  be  made  in  the  next 
chapter. 

During  the  season  1869-70  the  Ouorn  hunted  105 
days,  and  managed  to  kill  43  brace  of  foxes  and  run  18A 
brace  to  ground,  the  kennels'  strength  being  37 i  couples 
of  working  hounds.  The  sport  on  the  opening  day  was 
not  of  much  account,  and  it  was  not  until  the  end  of 
November  that  a  really  good  day  fell  to  their  lot.  On 
the  22nd  of  that  month  hounds  had  a  good  run  in  the 
morning  from  Ashby  Pasture,  and  a  second  fox  from 
Thorpe  Trussels,  after  running  a  ring  nearly  to  Gaddesby, 
turned  to  the  left  and  ran  in  a  straight  line  until  hounds 
were  whipped  off  in  the  dark.  They  had  previously 
enjoyed  a  very  good  day  in  Donington  Park,  finding 
in  the  home  coverts,  and  killing  their  fox,  after  a  very 
fast  thirty-five  minutes,  in  the  open  near  Kegworth, 
while  other  good  runs  came  with  tolerable  frequency 
afterwards. 

Mr.  Musters  was  a  most  popular  master.  A  staunch 
follower  of  the  Ouorn  has  left  it  on  record  that  his 
covert-side  greeting  was  quite  sufficient  to  put  a  man 
in  good  humour  for  the  rest  of  the  day,  even  if  no  sport 
resulted.  Springing,  as  he  did,  from  a  family  of  sports- 
men, it  is  but  natural  that  he  should  have  imbibed  the 
best  traditions,  and  approached  as  nearly  as  any  human 
being'  could  to  an  ideal  master  of  foxhounds.  Nor  must 
it   be  left  unsaid  that   Mrs.   Musters   in  no  small  degree 


MR.    JOHN    CHAWORTH    MUSTERS      311 

helped  to  add  to  the  success  of  her  husband's  all  too 
short  reign.  Kindly  and  genial  to  every  one,  social  life 
flourished  under  her  patronage,  and  it  was  with  genuine 
regret  that  the  Quorn  men  bade  adieu  to  Mr.  and  Mrs. 
Musters.  Mrs.  Musters,  it  will  be  remembered,  was  the 
compiler  of  two  interesting  little  volumes  of  items  in 
prose  and  verse  connected  with  hunting-. 


^#4' 


#•' 


:^f-     jjZ 


CHAPTER    XI 

MR.    J.    COUPLAND    (1870-1884) 


3'3 


CHAPTER    XI 

MR.     J.     COUPLAND 

1870-1884 

WHEN  Mr.  Musters  found  himself  unable  any 
longer  to  carry  on  the  Ouorn  Hunt,  he  made 
overtures  to  Mr.  Coupland  that  the  latter  should  join 
him  as  a  kind  of  partner,  and  see  to  the  hunting  of 
the  hounds,  Mr.  Musters,  at  the  same  time,  agreeing  to 
lend  his  pack  to  the  country.  This  arrangement  was 
virtually  carried  out  during  the  season  of  1870-71,  but 
Mr.  Coupland  was  during  that  time  the  acknowledged 
master. 

Mr.  Coupland  came  of  a  Cheshire  family,  and  was 
born  in  1834.  Eor  about  eight  years  in  early  life  he 
was  in  India,  and  while  there  he  established  a  pack 
of  hounds  at  Bombay.  On  returning  to  England  he 
hunted  from  Liverpool  with  the  Cheshire  hounds,  occa- 
sionally going  out  with  Sir  Watkin  Wynn's,  and  this 
strengthened  the  love  for  hunting  which  was  always  in 
him.  John  Walker,  then  Sir  Watkin's  huntsman,  was 
a  favourite  companion  of  Mr.  Coupland's,  and  from 
the  professional  the  future  master  of  the  Ouorn  learned 
many  precepts  of  the  chase. 

After  having  used  Mr.  Musters's  hounds  for  a  year, 
Mr.  Coupland  bought  the  Craven  pack  from  Mr.  George 
Willes,  who  had  just  given  up  the  Berkshire  country, 
and  concerning  the  first  appearance  of  these  hounds  in 

Leicestershire  there  are  two  versions.     Some  aver  they 

315 


316  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

were  quite  upset  by  the  rush  of  mounted  men  when  the 
fox  was  found  ;  others  deny  the  story.  They  were  well- 
bred  and  excellent  workers,  but  had  been  accustomed  to 
hunt  in  a  rather  cold-scenting  plough  country,  where  over- 
riding was  not  practised.  When  they  came  to  Leicester- 
shire it  took  them  some  time,  according  to  the  best 
accounts,  to  become  accustomed  to  the  new  surround- 
ings. However,  be  that  as  it  may,  the  purchase  is  a 
notable  one,  since  the  hounds  which  Mr.  Coupland  then 
bought  are  really  the  foundation  of  those  in  the  Quorn 
kennels  at  the  present  day,  as  never  since  that  time 
has  the  Quorn  pack  been  dispersed. 

Mr.  Coupland,  besides  being  a  fine  horseman,  was 
one  of  the  early  members  of  the  Coaching  Club,  and 
at  one  time  his  well-appointed  drag  was  familiar  to  all 
the  habituds  of  Hyde  Park.  He  was  also  known  in 
connection  with  steeplechasing :  he  himself  had  been 
seen  in  the  saddle  at  Hoylake,  and  among  other  horses 
he  owned  Staunton,  Bannockburn  (who  beat  Brick  at 
Birmingham),  Round  Text,  and  some  others.  About 
the  year  1867  Mr.  Coupland  married  Mrs.  Webster, 
daughter  of  Sir  Henry  Calder,  and  grand-daughter  of 
the  first  Earl  of  Limerick,  and  though  Mrs.  Coupland 
did  not  ride  to  hounds  very  much,  she  hunted  a  good 
deal  on  wheels. 

As  already  mentioned,  Frank  Gillard  began  as 
huntsman,  but  Mr.  Coupland  released  him  in  conse- 
quence of  the  representations  of  the  Duke  of  Rutland, 
and  in  his  place  arrived  James  Macbride,  who  came 
from  Lord  Fitzhardinge.1 

1  James  Macbride,  who  died  in  1886,  at  the  age  of  fifty-five,  whipped  in 
to  the  Quorn  from  1863  to  1866,  when  Mr.  Clowes  was  master  ;  John  Goddard 
was  huntsman,  and  Tom  Firr  second  whip.  He  was  next  huntsman  to  the 
Shropshire,  then  under  Mr.  Hill,  in  1866,  and  after  three  years  there  he 
went  to  the  Berkeley,  on  the  retirement  of  Harry  Ayris  ;  and  then,  after 
one  season  with  Lord  Fitzhardinge,  came  to  the  Quorn  for  two  seasons  in 
succession  to  Frank  Gillard.     Leaving  the  Quorn,  he  went  to  the  Meath, 


MR.    J.    COUPLAND  317 

Mr.  Musters's  horses  were  brought  to  the  hammer, 
being  sold  by  Messrs.  Tattersall  in  May  1870  ;  and  thirty- 
one  horses  fetched  3300  guineas,  and  four  hacks  187 
guineas.      The  highest  price  realised  was  300  guineas. 

Though  in  many  ways  the  Ouorn  led  the  fashion 
in  hunting,  no  puppy  show  was  held  in  connection  with 
the  pack  until  the  summer  of  1870,  when,  under  the 
auspices  of  Mr.  Coupland,  the  then  growing  custom 
was  followed,  and  the  master  presented  prizes  to  the 
farmers  who  walked  the  best  puppies,  and  it  led  to 
very  good  results.  The  proposal,  however,  originally 
came  from  Mr.  Musters.  Curiously  enough  (this  is 
stated  on  the  authority  of  the  Leicester  Journal,  Friday, 
August  12,  1870),  from  the  days  of  Osbaldeston  to 
the  date  just  mentioned,  the  farmers  of  Leicestershire 
had  never  expressed  any  strong  desire  to  promote  the 
sport  so  many  liked  by  walking  puppies,  but  the  hope 
was  expressed  that  they  would  then  be  induced  to  do 
so.  The  judges  on  the  occasion  of  the  first  puppy  show 
were  John  Walker,  Frank  Goodall,  and  Tom  Firr  (the 
present  huntsman).  Fifteen  couples  of  hounds  were  put 
forward,  and  Mr.  Peats,  of  Edwalton,  took  a  cup  with 
Flurrier,  and  Mr.  Farthing  another  with  Transit,  and 
these  puppy  shows  were  held  in  succeeding  years ;  while 
in  1873  Mr.  Coupland  gave  the  winners  the  option  of 
taking  either  a  cup  or  a  ,£10  note,  and  the  master 
notified  that  any  one  who  wished  to  walk  a  puppy  could 
have  one  by  making  application  to  the  huntsman  at  the 
Quorn  kennels,  but  it  scarcely  appears  that  he  was  over- 
whelmed with  offers. 

and  hunted  that  pack  for  four  seasons.  He  next  returned  to  the  Shrop- 
shire country,  the  then  master  of  which  was  Mr.  Hulton  Harrop,  where  he 
remained  till  that  gentleman  gave  up  the  country.  He  was  then  the  reci- 
pient of  a  testimonial,  as  well  as  of  a  gold  watch  and  a  chain,  given  by  the 
master  and  his  wife.  Thence  he  moved  into  Cheshire,  and  took  service 
with  Mr.  Corbet  as  first  whip  and  kennel  huntsman  ;  with  him  he  remained 
till  the  time  of  his  death.     He  was  a  light  weight,  and  a  capital  horseman. 


3i8  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

Leaving  the  flags  for  the  field,  a  chronicler  of  former 
years  wrote  : — 

To  swim  the  Wreake,  where  it  is  no  more  than  twenty  or 
thirty  feet  wide,  at  the  end  of  a  fine  run,  was  sufficient  to  give 
Lords  Brudenell  and  Gardner  a  place  in  the  hunting  history  of 
Leicestershire,  which  will  never  be  forgotten.  In  fact,  crossing 
a  river  is  so  seldom  attempted  that,  with  the  exception  of  the 
instance  just  mentioned,  and  the  occasion  when  Lord  Grey  de 
Wilton  and  Captain  Williams  swam  the  Wreake  near  Asfordby, 
in  the  days  of  John  Treadwell,  who  contented  himself  with 
keeping  to  dry  land,  and  seeing  how  they  did  it,  I  cannot  call 
to  mind  an  instance  of  crossing  deep  water.  However,  some 
days  since,  when  the  Quorn  met  at  Lockington,  the  hounds  went 
away  with  their  fox  from  Bottoms  Gorse,  and  ran  across  the 
meadows  to  the  Soar,  which,  always  very  wide,  was  swollen 
with  recent  rains  into  such  a  state  of  flood  that  many  ideas  will 
present  themselves  before  that  of  plunging  into  it.  The  hounds, 
however,  pressed  their  fox  closely,  and  with  no  chance  of  turning 
he  was  obliged  to  take  to  the  water,  followed  by  the  pack,  who, 
to  the  astonishment  of  all,  were  quickly  followed  by  the  young 
Lord  Panmure,  who  plunged  boldly  in,  with  a  strong  stream  and 
a  good  long  straight  swim  before  him.  Few  thought  that  he  would 
survive  it,  but  he  did,  and  landed  in  safety  on  the  other  side, 
after  which,  as  the  remainder  of  the  field  had  to  work  two  miles 
round  to  a  bridge,  he  had  the  hounds  all  to  himself,  having 
fully  deserved  the  honour,  by  the  almost  unexampled  pluck  he 
displayed. 

Another  paper,  however,  disputes  the  identity  of  the 
swimmer,  and  says  that  it  was  the  Hon.  William  E.  C. 
Stanhope,  son  of  the  Earl  of  Harrington,  who  crossed 
the  river.  Anyhow,  history  repeats  itself,  for  in  Captain 
Pennell-Elmhirst's  "Cream  of  Leicestershire"  there  is 
an  account  of  how,  in  1871,  the  Quorn  hounds  met  at 
Cossington,  and  after  an  hour's  run  came  down  to  the 
banks  of  the  Wreake,  near  Thrussington  Mill.  A  great 
deal  of  rain  had  fallen,  and  the  river  was  as  yellow  as 
the  Tiber  is  supposed  to  be.  Captain  Elmhirst  says 
that  a  rider  in  black  plunged  into  the  river,  off  a  perpen- 


MR.    J.    COUPLAND  319 

dicular  bank,  and  gratefully  shook  himself  on  the  other 
side  ;  but  the  author  of  the  "  Cream  of  Leicestershire  " 
does  not  say  who  the  "gentleman  in  black"  was.  It 
may  be  stated  here,  however,  that  this  adventurous 
horseman  was  none  other  than  the  gallant  captain  him- 
self. He,  like  Lord  Panmure  or  Mr.  Stanhope,  which- 
ever it  was,  had  the  hounds  all  to  himself,  while  the  field 
went  to  seek  for  a  bridge.  The  captain  swam  the  river 
by  the  mill,  and  terribly  frightened  the  miller,  who, 
when  asked  by  some  one  else,  "What  did  you  think  of 
the  feat,  my  good  miller?"  replied,  "Why,  I  just  stood 
stock  still  and  never  said  a  word,  thinking  he  would  be 
drowned."  In  the  Shropshire  country  the  Severn  has 
been  swum  by  more  than  one  person,  one  of  the  ad- 
venturous spirits  being  Sir  Richard  Green  Price,  who, 
under  the  name  of  "  Borderer,"  is  well  known  to  many 
hunting  men  outside  his  own  country — Shropshire. 

At  the  end  of  Mr.  Coupland's  first  season  he  began 
the  practice,  which  he  subsequently  continued,  of  selling 
his  horses  at  the  end  of  each  season.  His  first  sale 
took  place  in  May  1871,  and  the  horses  were  voted  an 
exceedingly  workmanlike  lot.  Indeed,  Mr.  Coupland 
said  that  half  of  the  stud  was  too  good  for  the  forest 
work.  Some  of  the  horses  went  cheaply  enough,  but 
the  highest  price  was  300  guineas,  thirty-five  hunters 
and  four  hacks  being  sold  for  a  total  of  4300  guineas. 

Just  before  the  sale  took  place  the  Ouorn  had  a  very 
oood  run  with  a  fox,  which  led  them  into  the  Belvoir 
country,  and  when  the  Duke  of  Rutland  next  greeted 
the  Ouorn  contingent  at  Denton,  his  remark  on  the 
previous  day's  sport  was,  "So  I  hear  you  rode  over 
all  my  best  country  yesterday  morning,  went  back  to 
Melton  to  luncheon,  and  rode  over  the  hounds  all  the 
afternoon."  The  chronicler  stated  that  the  duke  was 
not  far  wrong. 

The    Prince  of  Wales   had,    a    year   or    two    before, 


32o  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

enjoyed  a  capital  run  with  the  Belvoir  from  Hose  Gorse, 
but  in  the  March  of  1871  he  came  to  Melton  to  stay 
with  Sir  Frederick  Johnstone,  and  have  a  few  days' 
sport  with  the  Ouorn.  It  was  his  Royal  Highness's 
desire  to  have  a  quiet  day,  and  to  dispense  with  the 
crowd  of  an  advertised  meet,  at  which  it  would  be 
known  he  would  be  present,  so  Mr.  Coupland  arranged 
a  bye-day  from  Ragdale,  on  Thursday,  March  16,  the 
fixture  being  kept  so  close  a  secret,  that  very  few  only 
were  aware  of  what  was  going  on.  The  day,  however, 
was  not  by  any  means  suitable  for  hunting,  as  plenty 
of  snow  was  about,  and  it  was  not  till  somewhere  near 
three  o'clock  that  hunting  really  began.  A  fox  was 
found  at  Thrussington  Wolds,  but  was  soon  lost,  when 
the  hounds  were  taken  to  Cossington  Gorse,  some  three 
miles  distant,  and  from  there  a  merry  little  run  took 
place,  the  details  of  which  are  told  in  the  "  Cream  of 
Leicestershire"  at  page  21.  On  Friday,  March  17, 
Baggrave  Hall  was  the  fixture,  when  Colonel  Burnaby 
gave  a  breakfast,  the  magnificence  of  which  has  perhaps 
never  been  exceeded.  At  the  entrance  to  the  park  was 
a  triumphal  arch,  on  which  were  inscribed  the  names 
of  every  master  who  had  hunted  the  Quorn  country  for 
the  previous  hundred  years.  The  hounds  were  in  front 
of  the  house  ;  the  Prince  of  Wales  drove  up  punctually 
at  twelve  o'clock,  and  after  he  had  spent  something  like 
ten  minutes  or  a  quarter  of  an  hour  at  Baggrave  Hall, 
he  came  forth  to  sow  the  first  seeds  of  a  new  covert, 
which  Colonel  Burnaby  had  resolved  to  present  to  the 
Hunt  in  commemoration  of  the  occasion.  The  initials 
"A.  E."  were  cut  in  the  turf,  and  the  Prince  laid  what 
was  virtually  the  foundation-stone  of  what  is  known  as 
the  "  Prince  of  Wales's  Covert."  Colonel  Burnaby  had 
a  fox  in  waiting  in  one  of  his  own  coverts,  and  a  very 
good  run  ensued. 

When    hunting    was    over    Mr.    Coupland    went    to 


.-3 


MR.    J.    COUPLAND  321 

London  for  the  season,  and  in  the  month  of  August  found 
himself  before  Mr.  Dayman,  at  the  Hammersmith  Police 
Court,  on  a  charge  of  cruelty  to  a  horse,  the  prosecution 
being,  it  is  said,  instituted  by  his  next-door  neighbour, 
Mr.  Milbank,  M.P.  It  appears  that  Mr.  Coupland  had 
bought  a  cob  from  Mr.  Sheward,  the  dealer,  of  Green 
Street  (who  did  such  an  enormous  business  with  the 
late  Mr.  John  Gerard  Leigh,  master  of  the  Hertford- 
shire), as  a  match  for  another,  the  pair  being  for  the  use 
of  Mrs.  Coupland.  They  were  taken  into  the  Park,  and 
the  new  purchase  was  found  to  be  so  inveterate  a  jibber 
that  Mrs.  Coupland  was  obliged  to  go  home  in  a  cab. 
The  cob  was  at  length  induced  to  proceed,  but  instead 
of  being  taken  to  Sheward's  yard  in  Green  Street,  the 
vehicle  was  driven  to  Mr.  Coupland's  house  in  Crom- 
well Gardens  ;  and  when  the  time  came  to  drive  from 
there  the  animal  refused  to  budge  an  inch.  Thereupon 
Mr.  Coupland  brought  a  hunting-whip  to  bear  upon 
the  recusant  cob,  and  of  the  use  of  it  Mr.  Milbank 
complained.  The  evidence  of  Sheward's  men,  however, 
was  in  contradiction  to  that  of  Mr.  Milbank.  The 
R.S.P.C.A.  had  also  a  hand  in  the  affair,  and  Mr. 
Dayman's  remarks  are  not  undeserving  of  notice  even 
at  this  day.  In  dismissing  the  summons  he  said  that 
lately  the  Society  seemed  to  have  lost  sight  of,  and 
misconceived,  the  principles  of  the  Act  under  which 
they  were  enrolled,  and  had  on  several  occasions  sought 
to  strain  it,  and  he  feared  that  in  consequence  the  Act 
was  getting  into  disrepute. 

With  the  arrival  of  cub-hunting  time  1871-72  Mr. 
Coupland  returned  to  Leicestershire,  and  in  Septem- 
ber the  fatal  accident  occurred  which  cast  a  gloom  over 
the  commencement  of  the  hunting  season  at  Melton 
Mowbray.  Master  Charles  Claud  Henry  Webster,  the 
eldest  son  of  the  late  Mr.  Fox  Webster  and  Mrs. 
Coupland,  and  who  was  therefore  stepson  to  Mr.  John 


322  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

Coupland,  was  out  cub-hunting  when  the  hounds  went 
to  Gartree  Hill,  .and  while  at  the  covert-side  the  pony 
Master  Webster  was  riding,  on  hearing  the  hounds, 
became  somewhat  intractable.  He  reared  up  and  fell 
back  upon  the  youthful  sportsman,  who  received  such 
severe  injuries  that  he  died  on  the  following  morning, 
at  the  age  of  ten  years,  while  just  afterwards  a  very 
well-known  horseman,  Joseph  Hobson,  landlord  of  the 
Railway  Inn,  Loughborough,  was  also  killed  while  cub- 
hunting  with  the  Quorn.  He  endeavoured  to  jump  a 
gate  ;  his  mare  caught  the  top  bar  with  her  knees,  and 
falling,  rolled  right  over  her  rider,  who  was  put  into  a 
dogcart  in  an  insensible  condition,  and  died  on  the  way 
to  the  hospital. 

It  was  just  about  this  period  that  there  commenced 
that  long  dispute  in  connection  with  the  Quorn  country 
and  Mr.  Tailby's.  As  the  subject  is  mentioned  else- 
where, it  is  not  here  necessary  to  go  into  the  pros  and 
cons  of  the  incident,  which  gave  rise  to  a  long  corre- 
spondence and  not  a  little  trouble. 

A  contemporary  writer  stated  that  amongst  the 
notices  of  applications  to  Parliament  for  the  next  ses- 
sion there  figured  one  from  "  the  already  twice  accursed 
Midland  Railway  Company,"  which  had  thrust  itself 
rudely  over  the  land  stretching  from  Leicester  to  Mel- 
ton and  Harborough.  "  To  look  at  the  list  of  names 
mentioned,"  says  the  above-mentioned  writer,  "one 
would  gather  that  the  whole  of  the  south-east  of  Lei- 
cestershire is  shortly  to  be  transformed  into  a  kind  of 
Clapham  Junction,"  and  he  stated  that  the  line  might 
possibly  involve  the  destruction  of  several  famous  and 
valuable  coverts.  The  company  stated  in  their  appli- 
cation that  they  would  vary  or  extinguish  all  existing 
rights  and  privileges  which  would  interfere  with  their 
projects,  but  like  many  other  matters,  the  threat  was 
scarcely  carried  out,  and  the  institution  of  railways  has 


MR.    J.    COUPLAND  323 

not    been    such    a    bugbear    to    hunting    as    was    once 
thought  it  would  be. 

In  the  December  of  1871  the  untimely  death  of 
Lord  Chesterfield  was  announced,  and  caused  much 
regret  in  Leicestershire.  Some  years  previously  he 
spent  much  of  his  time  at  Melton,  and  was  known  as 
a  bold  and  hard  rider.  In  those  "  larkings "  which 
often  took  place  after  hunting  back  to  Melton  he  was 
frequently  a  leader,  and  he  amused  himself  when  hounds 
were  not  running  very  fast  by  jumping  some  of  the  most 
awkward  stiles  to  be  found  in  the  Midlands.  As  years 
went  on,  however,  he,  like  Mr.  Richard  Sutton,  rather 
forsook  hunting  and  took  to  shooting,  while  later  still  he 
interested  himself  before  everything  else  in  the  working 
of  his  coal-mines.  On  one  occasion,  when  he  and  some 
companions  larked  home,  he  jumped  a  very  formidable 
stile  for  a  bet,  and  having  won  the  wager  he  jumped  the 
obstacle  each  way  again,  and  dared  any  of  his  friends  to 
follow  him.  On  another  occasion,  after  a  nearly  blank 
day,  some  of  the  Meltonian  division  started  to  lark 
home.  From  Thrussington  they  went,  as  straight  as 
they  could  make  their  way,  over  some  of  the  stiffest 
parts  in  the  Ouorn  country,  taking  a  line  nearly  parallel 
with  the  river  up  towards  Asfordby,  then,  going  between 
the  village  of  Thrussington  and  the  bridge,  the  little 
party  rode  all  together  at  the  brook,  close  to  where  it 
joins  the  larger  stream — a  decidedly  big  jump.  Three 
got  in,  but  the  remainder  of  the  band  landed  safely  on 
the  other  side,  and  all  of  them  had  to  follow  the  lead  of 
Lord  Chesterfield,  who  took  them  over  the  big  Hoby 
enclosures  with  a  clear  lead,  and  reached  Asfordby  nearly 
two  fields  before  anybody  else. 

Several  instances  of  two  packs  clashing  are  on  record, 
and  in  February  1872  Mr.  Musters,  who  had  gone  back 
to  his  own  country  in  Notts,  clashed  with  the  Ouorn. 
When  the  latter  were  within  two  fields  of  Cotgrave  Gorse, 


324  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

Mr.  Musters  and  his  fine  pack  of  hounds,  together  with 
what  the  chronicler  calls  "his  motley  crew,"  appeared  on 
the  scene.  Mr.  Musters  was  the  quicker  to  the  holloa, 
and  the  two  packs  of  hounds  ran  the  same  line. 
Macbride  of  the  Quorn,  then  in  his  second  and  last 
season,  was  only  five  yards  behind  the  Squire,  and  the 
whole  forty  couples  went  along  as  hard  as  they  could  go. 
Some  little  fun  was  poked  at  Mr.  Musters's  followers, 
who  are  described  as  wearing  caps  and  brown  breeches, 
but  the  hounds  kept  well  out  of  the  way  of  the  crowd, 
and  eventually  ran  their  fox  to  ground  close  to  Colston 
Basset. 

Just  about  the  same  time  came  the  announcement 
of  the  death  of  Will  Derry,  a  well-known  and  highly 
respected  hunt  servant.1 

On  the  beginning  of  the  season  1872-73,  a  London 
daily  paper  contained  an  article  headed,  "The  Quorn  at 
Kirby  Gate."  Therein  the  writer  made  mention  of  the 
"specially  succulent  pork  pies"  of  Melton  Mowbray,  and 
he  proceeded  to  state  that  the  trade  in  them  was  in  a 
great  measure  provoked  by  the  presence  of  hunting  men, 
who  find  that  "particular  edible,  when  cut  into  slices,  to 
be  about  the  most  convenient,  not  to  say  filling,  luncheon 
which  they  can  carry  about  with  them !  " 

The  opening  of  the  year  1873  saw  a  sa-d  accident 
occur  to  Lady  Ida  Hope,  of  Park  House,  Melton  Mow- 
bray, who  broke  her  arm  while  hunting  with  the  Quorn 
hounds.     They  met  at  Brooksby  Hall,  and  in  the  course 

1  He  was  second  whipper-in  to  Mr.  Musters  in  Northamptonshire,  the 
first  being  Tom  Smith,  afterwards  huntsman  to  the  Brocklesby,  and  it  is 
supposed  that  the  portraits  of  these  two  appeared  in  Aiken's  sketch  of  "  The 
Squire  Hunted  by  his  Hounds,"  as  given  in  Mr.  Vyner's  Notttia  Venatica. 
From  the  Pytchley  Derry  went  on  to  the  Quorn,  of  which  pack  he  was  first 
whip  under  George  Mountford  in  Mr.  Rowland  Errington's  time.  Then, 
when  Lord  Chesterfield  became  master  of  the  Pytchley,  Derry  went  to  that 
country  as  huntsman,  and  during  that  brief  but  brilliant  dynasty  he  was 
magnificently  horsed,  while  master  and  man  rode  as  hard  against  each  other 
as  did  "Ginger"  Stubbs  and  Tom  Crommelin.  When,  however,  "Gentle- 
man "  Smith  took  the  Pytchley,  Derry  declined  to  stop  with  him. 


MR.    J.    COUPLAND  325 

of  a  slow  hunting  run  Lady  Ida  Hope's  horse  fell  at  a 
fence.  On  the  same  day  Lord  Grey  de  Wilton's  horse 
was  caught  in  a  sheep  net,  and  falling  heavily  rolled  two 
or  three  times  over  his  rider,  hurting  him  so  much  that 
at  one  time  it  was  supposed  the  injury  would  prove  fatal. 
However,  the  hurt  turned  out,  fortunately,  to  be  not  so 
bad  as  was  at  first  imagined  ;  but  the  muscles  of  one 
shoulder  were  very  much  lacerated,  and  he  was  kept  out 
of  the  saddle  for  some  time. 

The  season  1872-73  opened  as  usual  at  Kirby  Gate, 
but  as  a  matter  of  fact  there  was  no  Kirby  Gate,  for  the 
day  for  abolishing  the  time-honoured  toll-bar  came  on 
the  date  on  which  the  Quorn  were  to  meet  there.  On 
November  1  the  Turnpike  Trust,  with  which  it  had  its 
being,  breathed  its  last,  and  from  that  time  to  the 
present  Kirby  Gate  has  really  had  no  local  habitation, 
though  of  course  its  name  survives. 

In  connection   with  the  now  popular  amusement  of 
hunting  on   wheels,  some  of  the  inhabitants  of  Leices- 
ter set  forth  early   in  January    1873  to   see   what  sport 
they  could  from  a  wagonette,  and  drove  to  Charnwood 
Forest,  prepared  to  take  part  in  a  sort  of  picnic,  judging 
from  the  hampers  and    boxes   with   which  all  the  spare 
room  was   occupied.      The  driver  was   one   who  knew 
every   inch  of  the  country,   and  had  promised  to  drive 
from  point  to  point  so  that  his  passengers  should  see 
almost  as  much  of  the  run  as  those  who  were  on  horse- 
back.     In  order  to  be  as  good  as  his  word,  he  at  one 
point  left  the  hard  high-road  for  a  green  lane,  and  had 
the  vehicle  been  in  good  condition  all  might  have  gone 
well.     The  party,  however,  was  a  heavy  one,  while  the 
road  was  not  too  good  ;  and  so,  before   they  had  gone 
very  far  the  vehicle  parted  in  the  middle,  the  horse  and 
the  fore  wheels  trotting  on,  while  the  hind  wheels  and 
the  party  remained  behind,  the  passengers,  it  need  hardly 
be  said,  being  pitched   into   the   mud.      The  horse,  like 


326  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

that  ridden  by  the  famous  John  Gilpin,  when  freed  irom 
his  encumbrance  careered  merrily  along,  with  the  two 
wheels  dano-line  at  his  heels,  and  rushed  in  among  a 
batch  of  the  field,  causing  them  to  scatter  in  all  direc- 
tions. The  next  contingent  were  up  wind,  and  did  not 
hear  the  shouts  of  those  who  had  been  first  attacked, 
but,  as  a  correspondent  said,  ''each  wheel  did  its  duty," 
and  scars  innumerable  on  the  hocks  of  the  horses  were 
visible  for  some  time  after. 

The  February  of  1873  saw  quite  a  throng  of  nota- 
bilities at  the  Harborough  Hotel,  Melton  Mowbray. 
There  is  a  story  to  the  effect  that  one  staunch  member 
of  the  Quorn  Hunt,  hearing  that  Prince  Lichtenstein, 
Prince  Grisky,  Prince  Rohan,  and  Count  Erdody  were 
amongst  those  present,  declared  that  going  out  with  the 
Ouorn  reminded  him  of  hunting  from  Rome.  On  Mon- 
day, February  9,  their  Highnesses  went  to  meet  the 
Quorn  hounds  at  Widmerpool  Inn.  They  enjoyed  a 
very  good  day's  sport,  and  it  was  expected  that  the 
Prince  of  Wales  would  have  come  down  to  the  Har- 
borough Hotel  at  the  same  time,  but  for  some  reason  or 
other  his  visit  was  postponed. 

Mr.  Coupland,  having  sold  his  stud  at  the  end  of  the 
season  of  1871-72,  was  not  long  in  getting  together  a 
fresh  supply  for  the  following  season,  and  it  is  said  that 
the  fifty  horses  and  more  which  were  then  housed  in  the 
famous  long  stable  at  Ouorn  and  in  other  buildings  were 
an  exceedingly  good  lot,  showing  more  quality  than 
those  he  had  possessed  before,  regard  being  had  to  their 
character  as  well  as  their  appearance.  In  a  run,  however, 
which  took  place  in  February  horses  were  at  a  discount, 
as  the  pack  had  the  fun  all  to  themselves.  When  hunting 
in  the  vicinity  of  Grace  Dieu,  the  pack  found  a  fox  in  a 
small  plantation  near  One  Barrow  Lodge,  and  ran  him 
at  a  pretty  good  pace  up  Timber  Wood  Hill.  The  field 
were  a  little  bit  behind,  and  when  Tom  Firr  and  a  few 


MR.   J.    COUPLAND  327 

others  reached  the  wood,  they  saw  a  leash  of  hounds 
running  as  hard  as  they  could  go  some  fields  away, 
apparently  with  a  breast-high  scent.  Every  one  sup- 
posed that  these  were  the  tail  hounds  of  the  pack,  so  on 
they  went,  and  had  a  capital  run  towards  Bardon  Hill, 
but  failed  to  find  any  more  than  the  leash  of  hounds  in 
front  of  them,  for  the  all-sufficient  reason  that  no  other 
hounds  were  on  the  line.  In  the  meantime  the  main 
body  of  the  pack  had  started  another  fox  and  turned 
short  to  the  left  out  of  Timber  Wood,  and  him  they  ran 
to  ground  without  a  single  horseman  being  with  them. 
Some  of  Lord  Stamford's  keepers  viewed  the  pack 
racing  along,  and  of  course  were  surprised  to  see  no  one 
with  them,  and  then  assuming  that  the  field  had  some- 
how or  other  been  left  behind,  they  managed  to  entice 
the  hounds  to  Newtown  Linford,  where  they  shut  them 
up  in  a  stable,  and  a  messenger  was  sent  to  Quorn  to  say 
what  had  become  of  them.  Meantime  the  huntsman 
and  his  attendants  were  scouring  the  neighbourhood  on 
horseback  to  find  the  missing  pack,  but  of  course  without 
success. 

Mention  has  already  been  made  of  Tom  Firr,  and  as 
the  end  of  the  season  1871-72  saw  the  departure  of 
Macbride,  a  halt  may  here  be  made  to  note  the  arrival 
of  Firr  as  huntsman  ;  and  at  the  present  moment  (1898) 
he  still  occupies  that  proud  position,  which  he  has  thus 
held  for  twenty-six  years.  A  love  for  hunting,  like 
wooden  legs,  is  said  to  run  in  families,  and  it  is  only 
perhaps  right  that  a  short  sketch  of  the  worthy  hunts- 
man's life  should  be  given. 

Tom  Firr,  after  being  with  sundry  packs,  went  to  the  Cam- 
bridgeshire, then  under  the  mastership  of  Mr.  Barnett,  and  on 
leaving  there  he  went  to  another  plough  country,  the  Craven,  then 
under  Mr.  Theobald,  after  which  he  joined  the  Tedworth,  when 
old  George  Carter  hunted  the  hounds,  and  Jack  Fricker  was  first 
whip.     After  one  season  there,  he  whipped  in  to  the  Quorn,  under 


328  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

John  Goddard  —  that  was  in  the  first  season  of  Mr.  Clowes's 
mastership — and  after  one  year  there  he  left  to  join  Lord  Eglin- 
ton  in  Scotland,  under  George  Cox.  His  next  step  was  to  go 
to  Colonel  Anstruther  Thomson  as  second  whipper-in  to  the 
Pytchley,  but  at  that  time  he  could  have  had  first  whip's  place 
in  Norfolk  ;  in  fact  he  was  apparently  engaged,  but  having  once 
tasted  the  sweets  of  the  grass,  he  scarcely  cared  to  continue  to 
carry  on  in  a  plough  country.  While  with  Colonel  Anstruther 
Thomson  he  gave  so  much  satisfaction  that  when  Mr.  Lant,  the 
master  of  the  North  Warwickshire,  wanted  a  huntsman  Colonel 
Thomson  recommended  Firr  for  the  berth,  which  he  obtained,  and 
so  stepped  from  the  post  of  second  whipper-in  to  that  of  huntsman, 
without  ever  having  been  first  whip.  In  Warwickshire  Tom  Firr 
stayed  three  years,  and  gave  great  satisfaction  to  everybody,  and 
showed  capital  sport.  Then,  when  Macbride  left  the  Quorn,  Mr. 
Lant  very  kindly  said  he  would  not  stand  in  Firr's  way,  so  in  1872 
he  went  to  Mr.  Coupland,  and  is  now  entering  upon  his  twenty- 
seventh  season  as  huntsman  in  the  Quorn  country,  his  period 
of  office  exceeding  that  of  any  other  huntsman  with  the  pack,  unless 
perhaps  it  be  that  of  old  Jack  Raven;  and  how  many  years  he 
served  under  Mr.  Meynell  and  Lord  Sefton,  nobody  knows. 

The  Prince  of  Wales  again  paid  a  visit  to  Leicester- 
shire, attending  the  Melton  Steeplechases.  His  Royal 
Highness  made  a  very  short  stay  in  the  Midlands,  how- 
ever, and  the  only  time  on  which  he  hunted  was  when 
the  Quorn  had  a  by-day  at  Gaddesby.  They  had  a  very 
good  run  by  Billesdon  Coplow,  and  the  next  run  was 
also  good,  the  second  fox  being  really  killed  as  soon  as 
the  pack  reached  Thurnby  Spinney  ;  but  as  a  fresh  one 
went  away  at  the  same  moment,  with  the  body  of  the 
pack  at  his  brush,  the  huntsman,  who  did  not  know  of 
the  second  fox  being  killed,  brought  his  hounds  quickly 
on  the  line  of  the  fresh  one,  and  this  third  fox  was  even- 
tually run  to  ground.  On  this  day  the  Prince  of  Wales 
met  with  a  fall  at  a  boggy  place  near  Foxholes,  but  for- 
tunately was  not  hurt.  With  him  were  Lord  Wilton,  Lord 
Gardner,  Sir  Frederick  Johnstone,  Sir  Watkin  Wynn, 
Lord  Royston,  and  Colonel  (now  Sir)  Dighton  Probyn. 


MR.    J.    COUPLAND  329 

About  the  same  time,  too,  were  announced  the  deaths 
of  two  good  sportsmen,  well  known  in  Leicestershire. 
Lord  Hopetoun,  once  master  of  the  Pytchley,  died  at 
Rome  from  heart  disease,  from  which  it  is  said  he  suf- 
fered for  a  long  time,  although  for  several  years  he  had 
been  accustomed  to  hunt  six  days  a  week,  and  rode 
long  distances  to  covert  and  home.  The  second  death 
was  that  of  the  Hon.  H.  Coventry,  who  succumbed  to 
a  paralytic  stroke  at  his  residence  at  Pickwell. 

Towards  the  end  of  May  1873  the  Ouorn  stud  was 
sold  at  Tattersall's,  when  forty-six  hunters  realised  5836 
guineas,  giving  an  average  of  something  like  127  guineas 
each  ;  and  the  next  event  to  notice  is  the  gathering  of 
the  keepers  and  earth-stoppers  of  the  Quorn  Hunt  at 
Willoughby,  Loughborough,  and  Gaddesby,  where  every 
man  announced  that  his  particular  district  was  full  of 
foxes.  What  scheme  of  remuneration  was  formerly  in 
vogue  is  not  quite  clear,  but  it  appears  that  Mr.  Coup- 
land  was  the  first  to  start  the  system  of  rewarding 
keepers  by  results,  and  to  this  no  doubt  was  due  the 
increased  stock  of  foxes,  for  the  country  was  very  badly 
off  when  Mr.  Coupland  first  entered  upon  his  master- 
ship. For  the  preceding  three  seasons  the  keepers  had 
received  the  sum  of  ten  shillings  for  each  find  which 
took  place  in  coverts  under  their  respective  super- 
vision,1 and  the  season  1872-73  was  perhaps,  on  the 
whole,  one  of  the  most  successful  the  Ouorn  ever  saw 
up  to  that  time.  It  subsequently  transpired  that  no 
fewer  than  500  finds  had  been  paid  for  at  ten  shillings 
apiece,  which  meant  that  the  sum  of  ^250  was  distri- 
buted in  gratuities  to  keepers,  so  perhaps  it  is  no  wonder 
that,  on  the  new  plan  being  started,  the  keepers  saw 
that  to  preserve  foxes  was  to  do  something  to  their  own 

1  The  usual  condition  is,  that  if  a  fox  runs  to  ground  in  some  hole  in  the 
coverts,  which  should  have  been  stopped  by  the  keeper  on  whose  beat  the 
fox  was  found,  the  keeper  forfeits  the  money  he  would  otherwise  have 
received. 


33o  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

advantage.  The  superintendents,  however,  though  they 
did  their  parts  well,  were  energetically  backed  by  the 
landowners,  farmers,  and  occupiers  of  land  in  all  direc- 
tions, and  perhaps  the  feeling  towards  fox-hunting  was  as 
good  at  that  time  as  it  had  been  before  or  has  been  since. 

For  some  years  it  had  been  the  custom  at  the  time 
of  the  earth-stoppers'  and  keepers'  dinner  for  those  who 
had  any  claim  for  damages,  loss  of  poultry,  &c,  to  appear 
at  the  same  time,  and  as  many  of  the  aggrieved  tramped 
a  good  many  miles  to  the  rendezvous,  they  were  also 
invited  to  partake  of  the  feast  after  their  claims  had 
been  fully  investigated,  and,  if  correct,  paid.  The  total 
number  present  at  the  three  places  above  mentioned 
was  over  500,  and  the  local  committees  to  whom  the 
claims  were  submitted  attended,  the  master  presiding 
upon  each  occasion,  supported  by  a  good  many  of  the 
chief  farmers  in  the  district.  In  connection  with  the 
gathering  at  Gaddesby  the  business  of  investigating 
claims  began  at  ten,  and  from  that  time  until  three 
o'clock,  when  the  dinner  took  place,  Mr.  Coupland  and 
the  committee  were  working  hard  at  investigations  and 
the  discharge  of  liabilities. 

When  Auofust  came  round  there  was  a  hound  show 
at  Harrogate,  where  Lord  Kesteven,  Captain  Percy 
Williams,  and  John  Walker  were  the  judges,  while  a 
dozen  different  kennels  were  represented.  The  Ouorn 
were  a^ain  successful,  as  in  the  class  for  unentered  doo- 
hounds  the  first  prize  went  to  Mr.  Coupland's  Rattler, 

by  Factor  Rival,  the  latter  a  daughter  of  the  old 

favourite,  the  Craven  Albion.  The  champion  cup  for 
the  best  unentered  hound  in  the  yard  was  awarded  to 
the  same  dog. 

Like  Mr.  Musters,  Mr.  Coupland  became  so  popular 
with  the  earth-stoppers  that,  on  the  opening  day  of  the 
season  1873-74,  they  made  him  a  present  of  a  hunting- 
horn,  the  presentation  being  made,  as  a  correspondent 


MR.    J.    COUPLAND  331 

wrote,  in  a  speech  of  good  honest  Leicestershire  by  a 
patriarchal  earth-stopper.  In  accepting  it,  the  master 
of  the  Ouorn  returned  thanks  for  the  very  handsome 
testimonial  presented  to  him  by  keepers  and  earth- 
stoppers  of  the  Ouorn  Hunt  in  the  following  words  : — 

I  beg  most  sincerely  to  thank  you,  and  I  appreciate  your 
gift  far  more  than  I  can  express,  especially  as  I  am  told  how 
great  a  number  have  subscribed  to  it.  If  we  look  back  to  three 
years  ago,  when  there  was  scarcely  a  fox  on  this  side  of  the 
country,  I  think  we  may  certainly  congratulate  ourselves  that 
your  efforts  to  assist  the  fine  sport  of  fox-hunting  have  been  a 
complete  success,  and  that  this  is  the  finest  country  in  England. 
It  has  been  said,  I  believe,  that  I  have  turned  down  foxes  this 
year,  but  I  appeal  to  the  keepers  and  earth-stoppers  now  present 
if  that  is  the  case.  I  am  not  aware  that  a  single  fox  has  been 
turned  down  this  year  in  this  country,  and  the  fine  show  we 
now  have  to  go  on  with  is  the  result  of  your  exertions,  coupled 
with  the  assistance  the  farmers  have  kindly  afforded,  and  I  ven- 
ture to  take  this  opportunity  of  thanking  them  most  sincerely  for 
all  that  they  have  done  on  my  behalf  to  assist  our  sport. 

In  the  February  of  1874  the  huntsman  of  the  Ouorn 
met  with  an  accident,  as  in  jumping  a  brook  he  strained 
the  muscles  of  his  back,  reviving  an  injury  he  received 
in  the  previous  year.  In  the  same  month  hounds  were 
running  hard  after  their  fox  on  the  flat  near  Hoby,  when 
they  suddenly  came  to  a  full  stop  at  what  was  once 
Hoby  Mill.  Like  otter-hounds,  the  pack  took  to  the 
water  and  swam  to  the  other  side  of  the  river,  while 
at  the  same  time  Mr.  Tomkinson  and  Captain  Smith, 
seeing  no  better  way  across,  led  their  horses  over  a 
plank  bridge,  reaching  the  other  side  in  safety.  After 
them  came  Lord  Grey  de  Wilton,  Mr.  G.  Moore,  and 
a  hard-riding  clergyman.  They  followed  one  another 
pretty  closely,  and  their  united  weight  proving  too  heavy 
for  the  fragile  bridge  it  gave  way  beneath  them  ;  the  side 
railing  broke  away,  and  Lord  Wilton  was  knocked  over, 


332  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

with  his  horse  apparently  on  the  top  of  him,  the  other 
two  steeds  speedily  following  their  leader  into  the  water, 
and  there  they  were,  all  swimming  and  struggling  to- 
gether. Lord  Wilton  was  knocked  down  a  second 
time,  and  then  his  horse  jumped  over  him,  but  luckily 
without  inflicting  an  injury,  and  next  the  three  horses 
swam  out  into  the  main  stream,  one  of  them  not  being 
captured  until  he  had  gone  pretty  nearly  half  a  mile  to- 
wards Leicester.  Happily,  however,  neither  of  the  three 
horses  nor  the  three  riders  were  one  whit  the  worse. 

No  trace  of  the  fox  could  be  found  after  the  water 
adventure,  so  Firr  brought  the  hounds  back  again  to  the 
mill-dam,  and  there  he  found  his  fox  comfortably  hidden 
on  the  head  of  a  willow  tree.  The  pack  was  so  eager  to 
get  at  him  that  the  fox  thought  it  best  to  make  a  move, 
so  he  jumped  into  the  water,  and  therein  was  killed. 

This  day,  indeed,  was  by  no  means  devoid  of  inci- 
dent, for  earlier  in  the  day  a  fox  led  the  hounds  over 
the  grass  between  Shoby  and  Asfordby.  They  then 
ran  to  the  railway,  reaching  it  at  the  level  crossing 
near  Frisby,  where  some  score  of  the  field  took  to 
riding  along  the  line.  Presently  a  coal  train  came  in 
view,  and  those  who  had  elected  to  ride  on  the  line 
had  to  hurry  off  the  best  way  they  could,  and  were  next 
compelled  to  cross  under  the  line  by  a  narrow  wooden 
bridge,  where  the  towing  path  of  the  Wreake  runs 
beneath,  and  slippery  paths  had  here  to  be  encountered, 
while  the  archway  of  the  bridge  was  scarcely  higher 
than  the  horses'  heads  ;  and  as  the  train  drew  near  the 
last  of  the  batch  of  horsemen  grew  extremely  anxious, 
for  those  in  front  could  only  move  at  a  slow  foot-pace, 
and  had  one  horse  been  frightened  he  might  have 
brought  griefs  libitum  to  all  the  others.  This  obstacle, 
however,  was  successfully  surmounted,  as  also  was  that 
of  a  bridge  over  the  railway  with  a  hole  in  it ;  so  all 
ended  well. 


MR.    J.    COUPLAND  333 

About  this  time  the  covert  fund  question  cropped  up 
again,  as  Thursday,  February  19th,  the  business  pre- 
ceding a  by-day,  saw  a  meeting  convened  to  discuss 
the  state  of  the  covert  fund.  It  then  transpired  that  the 
country  was  indebted  to  Mr.  Coupland  to  the  extent  of 
about  ,£950,  which  sum  it  had  cost  him,  over  and  above 
the  covert  subscriptions,  to  bring  neglected  gorses  and 
spinneys  into  a  state  of  proper  efficiency.  Lord  Wilton 
was  in  the  chair,  explained  the  situation,  and  proposed 
an  immediate  payment  to  the  master.  No  one,  of 
course,  could  disagree  with  this,  nor  could  any  one  deny 
the  good  run  of  continuous  sport,  so  accordingly  names 
were  put  down  in  the  room  for  ^450,  while  subse- 
quently a  further  sum,  and  no  doubt  the  whole  of  the 
amount  required,  was  collected. 

The  spring  of  this  year  (1874)  brought  with  it  the 
death  of  Lord  Rossmore,  who  hunted  in  Leicestershire, 
and  who  was  killed  at  the  Windsor  Steeplechases  while 
riding  Lord  Downshire's  Harlequin  in  the  1st  Life 
Guards'  Challenge  Cup.  It  was  a  singular  coincidence 
that  two  or  three  years  previously  Lord  Rossmore  met 
with  an  accident  in  the  same  race,  at  the  very  same 
fence  at  which  he  was  killed.  On  the  first  occasion  he 
broke  his  collar-bone,  and  again,  curiously  enough,  he 
was  taken,  on  the  occasion  of  his  first  accident,  to  the 
same  room  in  the  officers'  quarters  in  which  he  after- 
wards died. 

In  connection  with  the  close  of  the  season  1873-74 
a  rather  amusing  story  was  current.  The  hounds,  as 
usual,  hunted  during  Holy  Week,  and  among  the  regular 
followers  was  a  gentleman  extremely  fond  of  hunting. 
and  a  constant  attendant  at  as  many  of  the  fixtures  as 
possible.  He  was,  besides,  a  staunch  High  Churchman 
and  ritualist.  Before  Lent  had  run  its  course,  a  friend 
asked  him  whether  he  intended  to  hunt  during  Holy 
Week.      His  companion,  whose  love  of  sport  evidently 


334  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

struggled  with  his  scruples,  replied,  "  Well,  I  don't 
know  ;  I  do  not  think  it  is  right."  "  But  where  is  the 
harm  ?  "  said  the  friend.  "  Well,  I  think  there  is  a 
certain  amount  of  harm,"  replied  the  other  ;  "  but  if  I 
do  any  hunting  in  Holy  Week,  I  shall  certainly  come 
out  in  trousers." 

The  first  week  in  August  1874  saw  the  holding  of 
the  Great  Yorkshire  Hound  Show— one  of  those  over 
which  Mr.  Thomas  Parrington  exercised  so  great  an 
influence.  The  Quorn  pack  rather  came  to  the  fore, 
winning  in  the  unentered  class  ;  but  the  year  is  memor- 
able from  the  fact  that  Quorn  Alfred  (he  came  in  a 
draft),  by  Mr.  Garth's  Painter,  out  of  Affable,  won  in  the 
stallion  hound  class;  while  Quorn  Watchman,  by  Belvoir 
Rally  wood,  out  of  Belvoir  Wanton  ;  Alfred  ;  Clasper, 
by  Belvoir  Charon,  out  of  Royalty  ;  and  Rattler,  by 
Factor,  out  of  Rival,  gained  the  first  prize  for  the  best 
two  couples  of  entered  hounds.  Of  Quorn  Alfred  it 
is  needless  to  say  much  ;  he  proved  himself  the  main- 
stay of  the  kennel,  and  his  name  is  venerated  to  the 
present  day. 

During  cub-hunting  in  the  season  of  1874-75  the 
late  Empress  of  Austria,  with  a  suite  described  by  a 
local  chronicler  as  "  consisting  of  seventeen  attendants 
and  four  horses,"  went  down  to  the  Harborough  Hotel, 
Melton  Mowbray,  to  have  a  day's  cub-hunting  with  the 
Belvoir,  returning  to  London  the  next  day,  after  inspect- 
ing the  Belvoir  kennels  and  stables.  Four  years  later, 
while  hunting  in  the  Pytchley  country,  the  Empress 
ao-ain  visited  Leicestershire,  arriving  at  Kibworth  station 
one  morning  at  ten  o'clock  to  meet  Mr.  Tailby's  hounds 
at  Burton  Overy.  The  Empress  was  on  this  occasion, 
as  usual,  piloted  by  the  late  Captain  Middleton,  and 
there  was  an  enormous  field  out. 

On  October  17,  1874,  the  hunting  world  was  robbed 
of  one  of  its  best  known  characters  in  the  person  of  Lord 


MR.    J.    COUPLAND  335 

Forester,  who  died  at  his  seat,  Willey  Park,  Shropshire, 
in  the  seventy-fourth  year  of  his  age,  after  having  lived 
for  some  time  in  comparative  retirement. 

Lord  Forester  was  a  son  of  the  first  lord,  who  was  better 
known  as  Cecil  Forester,  one  of  the  thorns  in  the  side  of  Mr. 
Meynell,  who  was  accustomed  to  say,  "  First  conies  the  fox  out 
of  a  covert,  then  Cecil  Forester,  and  then  my  hounds."  He  was 
born  and  lived  a  sportsman,  and  particularly  a  hunting  man. 
During  his  undergraduate  days  at  Oxford  he  was  well  known 
with  Sir  Thomas  Mostyn's  hounds,  the  Duke  of  Beaufort's,  and 
the  Duke  of  Grafton's.  After  hunting  in  Leicestershire  for  a  short 
time  on  his  own  account  he  became  master  of  the  Belvoir  in  1830, 
during  the  minority  of  the  eldest  son  of  the  Duke  of  Rutland, 
and  he  remained  at  the  head  of  that  famous  pack  for  something 
like  twenty-eight  seasons.  About  1858  he  married  the  widow  of 
Lord  Melbourne,  and  was  presented  at  Syston  with  a  testimonial, 
which  represented  in  silver  a  scene  with  his  hounds.  Goodall 
was  depicted  in  the  act  of  dislodging  a  fox  from  a  chestnut  tree 
in  Croxton  Park,  the  Duke  of  Rutland,  Lord  Forester,  Sir 
Thomas  Whichcote,  and  Mr.  Lickford  (the  last  named  the 
"  Father  of  the  Hunt ")  being  grouped  around,  while  a  few 
couples  of  favourite  hounds  were  also  brought  in.  Lord  Forester, 
who  was  an  exceedingly  handsome  man,  was,  it  may  be  remem- 
bered, introduced  by  Sir  Francis  Grant  into  the  picture  of 
"The  Melton  Breakfast."  He  at  one  time  held  some  appoint- 
ment in  the  Royal  Household,  but  was  never  so  well  known  in 
London  as  his  brother,  and  successor  to  the  title,  General, 
or  more  familiarly  known  as  Colonel  Forester,  Member  for 
Wenlock,  and  who  was  for  some  time  Father  of  the  House  of 
Commons. 

Only  a  little  later  the  Ouorn  men  were  grieved  to 
hear  of  the  death  of  Mrs.  Coupland,  the  wife  of  the 
master,  and  on  receipt  of  the  mournful  intelligence  the 
hounds,  which  were  to  have  met  at  Radcliffe-on-the 
Wreake,1  were  kept  in  kennel. 

1  From  what  has  been  said  before  in  connection  with  the  decease  of  Tom 
Day  and  Sir  Richard  Sutton,  this  fixture  had  a  curious  connection  with 
deaths  in  the  Quorn  country. 


336  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

In  December  1874  Lord  Grey  de  Wilton,  the  well- 
known  follower  of  the  Quorn  hounds,  found  himself  in 
the  County  Court  at  the  instance  of  the  Melton  Canal 
Company.  One  day,  while  following  the  Quorn,  he 
rode  his  horse  on  to  a  foot-bridge  belonging  to  the 
Canal  Company,  but  the  structure,  which  was  really 
designed  for  foot  passengers  only,  and  was  in  a  very 
shaky  condition,  gave  way  under  his  lordship  and  his 
horse,  both  being  precipitated  into  the  water.  In  the 
spirit  of  a  sportsman  Lord  Wilton  sent  a  man  to  esti- 
mate the  damage,  and  his  answer  was  that  the  job  could 
be  done  for  £5.  Thereupon  his  lordship  wrote  to  the 
Canal  Company  offering  to  pay  the  sum.  Meantime 
the  Highway  Board  appeared  upon  the  scene,  and  com- 
pelling the  Canal  Company  to  make  good  the  bridge, 
they  spent  over  ^20  on  the  work,  applying  to  his  lord- 
ship to  pay  ^15  towards  the  expenses.  Fortified  by  the 
decision  of  his  expert,  Lord  Grey  de  Wilton  declined 
to  pay  this  sum,  hence  the  action.  When,  however, 
it  came  on  for  hearing,  the  Canal  Company's  solicitor 
suggested  that  the  matter  should  be  referred  to  an 
arbitrator,  and  the  facts  were  laid  before  Mr.  William 
Garner,  one  of  the  town  wardens,  whose  decision  was 
that  the  ^5  his  lordship  had  previously  offered  amply 
sufficed  to  make  sfood  the  damage. 

About  this  time  we  find  a  writer  lamenting  the 
crowds  that  used  to  come  out  with  the  Quorn  on  Fridays, 
and  the  story  is  told  of  a  hard-riding  visitor  from 
another  Hunt  who  had  been  on  the  hounds'  backs 
pretty  well  all  day,  and  the  huntsman  was  gradually 
losing  his  patience.  There  was  also  another  follower 
who  was  somewhat  given  to  overriding  the  hounds. 
The  last-named  gentleman  measured  his  length  over  a 
somewhat  formidable  fence,  while  the  visitor  from  another 
country  was  in  the  act  of  riding  at  a  place  just  as  the 
hounds  were   feeling  their  way  to    it.      The   huntsman 


FULL    CRY. — WISSENDINB    PASTURE.       PRAWN    BY    H.    ALKKN. 


Gnat  H«m,  Clo„.  KttUthy  Clmnh 

THE    DEATH. — VIEW    OF    KETTLEBY.       DRAWN    BY    H.    ALKEN 


M,Um.  Bilidtm  Cop/oi 


MR.    J.    COUPLAND  337 

was  heard  to  make  some  remark  as  to  the  direction  the 
fox  might  probably  have  taken,  whereupon  the  visitor 
promptly  charged  a  tremendous  great  place,  and  came 
an  "imperial  crowner "  into  the  next  field.  Then  the 
huntsman,  much  relieved  in  his  mind,  gently  blew  his 
horn,  and  followed  up  his  fox,  free  from  what  advertise- 
ments call  "encumbrances." 

Lord  Stamford  still  kept  up  his  interest  in  the  Hunt, 
and  was  occasionally  out  with  them,  and  in  the  February 
of  1875  sustained  a  somewhat  bad  fall,  lacerating  the 
muscles  of  his  back,  a  mishap  which  necessitated  keeping 
his  bed  for  some  days,  while  at  the  same  time  the 
attention  of  the  landed  proprietors  and  members  of  the 
Ouorn  Hunt  was  drawn  to  the  annual  report,  just  then 
circulated  by  the  Hunt  Covert  Fund  Committee,  which 
showed  a  deficit  of  ^400.  Thereupon  some  resolutions 
were  come  to,  among  them  being  one  to  the  effect  that, 
havinor  regard  to  the  excellent  manner  in  which  Mr. 
Coupland  hunted  the  Ouorn  country,  and  with  a  view 
to  relieve  him  of  additional  burden,  all  strangers  should 
be  called  upon  to  subscribe  to  the  current  expenses 
of  the  pack,  and  a  local  committee  was  thereupon  ap- 
pointed to  aid  in  carrying  this  resolution  into  effect. 
The  document  embodying  the  proposal  was  signed  by 
Lord  Wilton,  Sir  Frederick  Fowke,  Mr.  Little  Gilmour, 
Mr.  P.  Herrick,  and  other  influential  members  of  the 
Hunt. 

Mr.  Coupland  had  all  along  been  very  deservedly 
popular,  not  only  with  the  followers  of  the  Ouorn,  for 
whom  he  catered  so  well,  but  also  with  the  farmers  for 
having  such  a  keen  regard  to  their  interests  ;  while  he 
subsequently  put  another  laurel  leaf  in  his  crown  by  plac- 
ing at  the  disposal  of  the  farmers,  free  of  all  charge,  a 
thoroughbred  stallion,  for  the  convenience  of  those  who 
might  be  desirous  of  breeding  hunters.  Though  for 
family    reasons    he    was    unable    to    be    present    at    the 

y 


338  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

Croxton  Park  and  Burrough  Hill  Races,  he  nevertheless 
gave  the  Quorn  Cup,  which  he  instituted  when  he  first 
took  the  pack. 

Mr.  Herrick,  above  mentioned,  a  well-known 
Leicestershire  sportsman,  did  not  long  survive,  as  in 
February  1876,  being  then  in  his  eighty-first  year,  he 
joined  the  great  majority.  On  the  morning  of  his  death 
he  was  apparently  quite  well,  in  spite  of  his  years,  and  as 
the  hounds  met  at  Woodhouse  Eaves,  close  to  his  seat, 
Beaumanor  Park,  he  went  out  on  horseback,  attended 
by  his  groom.  A  fox  being  found,  Mr.  Herrick  took 
part  in  the  run,  and  when  they  had  finished  with  the 
fox,  the  hounds  went  on  to  Bradgate  Park  ;  but  Mr. 
Herrick,  not  feeling  quite  strong  enough,  rode  home, 
and  died  very  shortly  after  his  return. 

Yet  another  hound  show  took  place  in  July  1875, 
this  time  at  Alexandra  Park.  Hitherto  hound  shows, 
as  will  have  been  seen  in  the  foregoing  pages,  had  been 
confined  almost  exclusively  to  Yorkshire.  Nevertheless 
a  few  attempts  had  been  made  to  bring  foxhound  shows 
into  the  South.  The  first  was  at  Islington  in  1866,  and 
the  second  at  the  Crystal  Palace  in  1874.  At  Islington, 
it  is  true,  the  Duke  of  Beaufort,  and  Mr.  Nevill,  ol 
Chilland,  in  Hampshire,  sent  some  hounds,  but  at  the 
Crystal  Palace  not  a  single  foxhound  was  there,  though 
their  absence  was  no  doubt  owing  to  the  fear  of  hydro- 
phobia, which  was  at  that  time  very  rife.  Mr.  Martin, 
however,  who  organised  the  Alexandra  Park  Show,  had 
special  advantages,  and  he  managed  to  make  a  success 
where  others  had  failed.  In  fact,  it  was  said  that  the 
entries  of  foxhounds  exceeded  those  seen  at  any  other 
show,  not  excepting  the  Yorkshire  gatherings.  The 
management,  however,  had  not  the  experience  of  the 
present  Peterborough  executive,  so  the  accommodation 
for  the  hounds  was  by  no  means  all  that  could  be  desired  ; 
and  as  the   hinges  of  the  doors  were  tacked   on   very 


MR.    J.    COUPLAND  339 

lightly,  hounds  were  constantly  forcing  gates  away  and 
running  about  all  over  the  place.  A  boarded  stage 
on  the  grass  did  duty  for  flagstones,  while  a  covered 
pavilion  was  spacious  enough  to  protect  any  reasonable 
number  of  people  from  sun  or  rain.  The  day  was 
certainly  unfavourable,  for  rain  fell  intermittently  ;  but 
the  capacity  of  the  pavilion  was  not  put  to  a  very  severe 
test,  for  the  spectators  numbered  no  more  than  about 
a  hundred.  Mr.  Henry  Villebois,  Mr.  Hope  Barton, 
and  Mr.  Leicester  Hibbert  were  the  judges,  and  in 
Class  II.,  for  the  best  two  couples  of  entered  dog 
hounds,  the  Quorn  were  successful  with  Watchman, 
Alfred,  Comrade,  and  Rattler  ;  while  in  another  class, 
for  the  best  two  couples  of  entered  hounds  under 
twenty-three  inches,  the  Quorn  were  again  to  the  fore. 
The  Quorn  Alfred  gained  the  championship  for  entered 
hounds,  and  the  same  famous  hound  brought  to  Tom 
Firr  a  cup  given  by  Messrs.  Spratt,  for  the  huntsman 
of  the  pack  showing  the  best  hound  in  the  show. 
Among  the  other  competing  packs  were  the  Queen's 
stacrhounds,  the  Duke  of  Beaufort's,  the  Old  Berkshire, 
the  Blackmore  Vale,  Brocklesby,  Essex,  North  Here- 
fordshire, Lord  Portsmouth's,  East  Essex,  West  Kent, 
and  the  West  Norfolk. 

Only  a  week  or  two  later  there  was  another  hound 
show  at  Driffield,  on  which  occasion  the  rival  kennels 
were  the  Burton,  the  North  Shropshire,  Quorn, 
Brocklesby,  the  Fitzwilliam,  Mr.  Cradock's  (now  the 
Marquis  of  Zetland's),  the  Tynedale,  Sir  Harcourt 
Johnston's,  the  York  and  Ainsty,  Rufford,  and  Bramham 
Moor.  Parson  Russell,  from  Devonshire,  Sir  Reginald 
Graham,  and  Mr.  John  Hill  were  the  judges  ;  and  here 
the  Quorn  were  again  successful  in  the  two-couple  class 
with  Watchman,  Alfred,  Rattler  and  Comrade,  while 
Alfred  showed  his  merit  by  again  obtaining  honours  as 
the  best  hound  in  the  show, 


34o  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

The  repository  of  Messrs.  Warner,  Shephard,  and 
Wade  is  now  well  enough  known,  but  for  something 
like  twenty  years  prior  to  1875  the  firm  sold  horses 
in  the  Bell  Paddock.  In  the  above-mentioned  year, 
however,  the  new  repository  was  opened,  proceedings 
beginning  with  a  luncheon,  at  which  Mr.  Coupland  pre- 
sided, supported  by  Lord  Combermere,  Sir  Frederick 
Fowke,  and  the  Mayor  of  Leicester.  On  this  occasion 
the  Ouorn  cub-hunters  were  sold,  and  the  thirteen  put 
up  for  auction  realised  1 1 50  guineas. 

In  February  1876  Firr  again  came  to  grief,  this 
time  through  a  wire  fence.  He  was  in  a  carriage  drive, 
flanked  by  wire  on  both  sides,  and  while  he  was  cheer- 
ing his  hounds,  his  horse  sidled  up  to  the  wire  fence  and 
one  of  his  legs  caught  between  the  strands;  becoming 
frightened  at  the  entanglement  he  set  to  work  to  plunge, 
and  eventually  fell  over  the  huntsman,  giving  him  a 
very  severe  fall.  He  was  taken  to  a  house  at  Thurnby, 
where  on  examination  it  was  found  that,  though  much 
bruised  and  shaken,  no  bones  were  broken. 

Towards  the  close  of  the  season  1875-76  the  Prince 
of  Wales  visited  Colonel  (now  General)  Owen  Williams 
at  the  Old  Club,  Melton.  It  was  the  Prince's  wish  that 
no  demonstration  should  be  made,  and  his  request  was 
of  course  complied  with.  He  dined  at  the  Old  Club 
with  Colonel  Owen  Williams,  Captain  Montague,  Mr. 
Sloane  Stanley,  Captain  Owen  Young,  Lord  Carrington, 
Captain  Glynn  (of  H.M.S.  SeTapis,  in  which  vessel  the 
Prince  of  Wales  went  to  India),  the  Marquis  of  Huntly, 
Sir  Lister  Kaye,  the  Hon.  Hugh  Lowther  (now  Earl  of 
Lonsdale),  Captain  Wingfield,  and  a  few  others  ;  and 
he  afterwards  enjoyed  a  day  or  two's  hunting  in  the 
neighbourhood.  In  the  spring  of  1877  the  Prince  paid 
another  visit  to  Leicestershire,  and  had  a  quiet  day  from 
Lowesby  with  the  Ouorn. 

The  summer  of  1876  once  more  saw  the  Ouorn  com- 


MR.    J.    COUPLAND  341 

peting  at  a  hound  show,  this  time  at  Skipwirth-in- 
Craven,  under  the  auspices  of  the  Yorkshire  Agricultural 
Society.  The  kennels  represented  were  the  Atherstone, 
Bedale,  Brocklesby,  Burton,  South  Durham,  Quorn,  and 
Lord  Zetland's,  but  some  of  them  scratched  at  the  last 
moment.  The  entries  were  smaller  than  usual  ;  but  the 
judges,  Mr.  John  Hill  of  Thornton,  and  John  Walker 
(Sir  Watkin  Wynn's  huntsman),  awarded  sundry  prizes 
to  the  Quorn — Governor,  Woodman,  Watchman,  and 
Wild  Boy  winning  in  the  two  couples  of  entered  hounds 
class.  The  Quorn  Alice  was  the  best  unentered  hound, 
and  the  Quorn  Rapid  the  best  brood  bitch.  The  cham- 
pionship cup  was  given  to  Atherstone  Somerset,  but 
many  were  of  opinion  that  it  should  have  been  given  to 
Alice,  who,  by  the  way,  was  by  the  famous  Alfred,  out  of 
Dewdrop. 

In  the  spring  of  1877  there  was  recorded  from  Melton 
an  instance  of  how  ill-advisable  it  is  to  act  upon  impulse. 
A  noble  lord  who  was  hunting  in  the  neighbourhood 
came  down  at  a  bullfinch,  but  was  luckily  unhurt.  His 
horse,  however,  remained  motionless,  and  was  to  all 
appearance  dead.  The  rider  thought  the  animal  had 
broken  its  back,  so  a  gun  was  sent  for,  and  the  horse 
was  shot.  On  a  post-mortem  examination  being  made, 
however,  it  was  discovered  that  he  had  sustained  no 
injury  whatever,  but  was  merely  knocked  out  of  time, 
as  the  saying  goes,  and  had  the  pin  test  been  applied 
the  life  of  a  valuable  horse  might  have  been  saved. 

From  a  dead  horse  to  a  dyed  one  is  but  a  step,  and 
another  story  was  current  in  Melton.  A  lady  was  staying 
at  a  house  a  few  miles  off,  and  discovered  that  her  bottle 
of  aureoline,  of  which  she  made  frequent  use,  had  been 
left  behind  by  her  maid.  A  groom  was  despatched  to 
fetch  it,  but  unluckily  he  put  it  into  his  pocket,  and 
while  riding  home  the  bottle  was  broken;  the  "gilded 
essence "    flowed   down   one   side    of  the   mare  he  was 


342  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

riding,  which  was  really  a  dark  brown,  but  for  several 
days  afterwards  her  appearance  was  a  curious  mixture  of 
gold  streaks  on  one  side,  and  in  the  Hunt  the  mare  was 
promptly  christened  "  Aureoline." 

In  the  April  of  1877  the  Queen's  staghounds  paid  a 
visit  to  the  Cottesmore  country,  meeting  at  Barleythorpe, 
Lord  Hard  wick  being  then  the  master.1 

There  was,  it  need  hardly  be  said,  an  enormous  field, 
and  there  was  a  breakfast  at  the  hall,  where  Lord  Lons- 
dale entertained  a  great  many  people  ;  and  at  ten  minutes 
past  twelve  the  deer-van  drove  into  the  park,  and  a  deer 
called  the  Baron  was  uncarted,  making  his  way  towards 
Langholm.  Then  turning  to  his  left,  he  took  a  capital 
line,  so  far  as  the  spectators  were  concerned,  as  the  deer 
could  be  seen  going  on  leisurely  for  more  than  a  mile. 
After  fifteen  minutes'  law,  Frank  Goodall  (who  had 
formerly  been  huntsman  to  Mr.  Tailby)  laid  on  the  pack, 
and  a  capital  run  succeeded,  though  most  of  it  took  place 
in  Rutlandshire  and  not  in  Leicestershire.  Lady  Dixie 
was  not  then  so  averse  to  stag-hunting  as  she  has  subse- 
quently shown  herself  to  be,  for  we  read  that  she  was 
present,  and  that  none  went  better  until  Launde  Brook 
brought  her  to  grief. 

The  August  of  1877  saw  another  hound  show  at 
York,  on  the  Knavesmire,  but  on  this  occasion  the 
Quorn  only  succeeded  in  taking  one  prize,  for  entered 
bitches,  with  the  badger  pied  Comely. 

So  well  had   Mr.  Coupland  worked  as  head  of  the 

1  In  olden  times  the  Queen's  staghounds  used  to  go  to  Aylesbury  for  a 
week  or  two,  and  also  to  the  New  Forest,  while  in  addition  they  have  made 
sundry  excursions  out  of  their  country.  About  the  year  1849  they  had  a  day 
in  Berkshire,  meeting  at  Buckland  ;  in  1868  the  Duke  of  Beaufort  invited 
them  to  meet  at  Troy  House,  in  the  Badminton  country  ;  in  1869  they  again 
met  in  the  old  Berkshire  country,  at  Goosey  Green,  where  a  field  of  about  a 
thousand  people  were  present ;  and  in  November  1882,  during  the  master- 
ship of  Lord  Cork,  the  Royal  hounds  were  taken  to  the  town  of  Frome, 
at  the  coming  of  age  of  Lord  Dungarvan,  Lord  Cork's  son  ;  while  later  still 
they  met  on  the  downs  near  Winchester. 


MR.    J.    COUPLAND  343 

Hunt,  that  it  was  noticed  in  the  year  1877  that  the  pack 
had  very  much  improved  in  quality.  It  was  said  that 
they  had  been  rather  mute  before,  but  Mr.  Coupland 
bred  far  more  for  music,  and  altogether  the  pack  rose  in 
every  one's  estimation. 

In  the  summer  a  rather  curious  function  took  place  at 
the  instigation  of  Colonel  Burnaby.  It  had  occurred  to 
him  that  a  dinner  should  be  given  to  old  soldiers  of  the 
county  of  Leicestershire  who  were  medal-holders,  the 
dinner  to  be  given  on  the  anniversary  of  the  battle  of 
Inkerman  ;  so  under  the  gallant  gentleman's  superin- 
tendence a  banquet  first  took  place,  and  afterwards  an 
assault-at-arms  was  arranged.  Officers,  hunting  men, 
and  many  others  subscribed  freely  in  support  of  the 
project,  while  the  Duke  of  Cambridge  and  the  Prince  of 
Wales  signified  their  approval  of  the  movement  by 
joining  the  list  of  subscribers.  Venison  was  roasted  in 
the  market-place,  and  soup  was  cooked  in  a  brazen 
vessel  presented  to  the  town  of  Leicester  by  John  of 
Gaunt.  All  the  old  soldiers  enjoyed  themselves  im- 
mensely. There  were  some  hundreds  of  them,  the 
report  said,  and  the  medals  displayed  showed  a  record, 
as  the  chairman  happily  stated,  from  Corunna  to  Coo- 
massie.  One  old  fellow  was  carried  to  the  dais  to  tell 
how  he  entered  the  army  in  1803,  and  it  is  mentioned  as 
a  somewhat  unusual  circumstance  that  every  man  kept 
as  sober  as  though  he  had  been  on  parade. 

In  Leicestershire,  we  are  told,  every  man,  woman, 
and  child  is  taught  to  venerate  and  preserve  the  fox  ;  but 
unluckily  there  have  been  a  good  many  exceptions,  and 
one  of  them  came  to  light  in  1878.  A  third  of  the 
country  was  said  to  be  exceedingly  short  of  foxes,  and 
one  gentleman  was  hinted  at  who,  though  a  hunting 
man,  allowed  his  keepers  to  kill  foxes  ;  while  it  was  said 
that  a  landed  proprietor,  whose  father  was  a  staunch 
preserver    of   foxes,    did    not    take    after    him,    that    his 


344  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

coverts  were  always  drawn  blank,  and  once  when  hounds 
ran  through,  pheasants  rose  in  hundreds,  while  after  this 
five  hundred  were  shot  in  two  days.  It  was  thought 
that  the  gentleman  in  question  would  very  likely  before 
lone  solicit  the  suffrages  of  the  electors,  and  a  follower  of 
the  Ouorn  pointed  out  that  it  would  be  well  to  remember 
his  indifference  to  the  fox-hunting  interest.  Whether  he 
ever  did  come  forward  as  a  candidate  for  Parliamentary 
honours  I  am  unable  to  say. 

The  Empress  of  Austria  paid  another  visit  to  Leices- 
tershire in  1878,  and  just  afterwards  Lord  James  Douglas 
sustained  a  very  nasty  fall.  His  horse  put  his  foot  in  a 
newly-made  drain  while  galloping  across  an  open  field. 
He  was  riding  wide  of  the  hounds,  and  so  no  one 
observed  the  fall.  When  Lord  James  came  down  the 
sun  was  shining  brightly,  but  when  he  returned  to  con- 
sciousness he  found  a  labourer  standing  over  him  by  the 
light  of  the  moon.  Thanks  to  the  labourer's  orood  offices 
he  was  taken  to  a  house,  and  in  due  time  recovered. 

A  further  proof  of  Mr.  Coupland's  popularity  is 
shown  from  the  fact  that  in  1879  the  members  of  the 
Quorn  Hunt  made  up  their  minds  to  present  the  master 
with  a  fitting  gift  in  commemoration  of  his  approaching 
marriage,  while  the  tenant-farmers  on  the  Billesdon  side 
gave  him  two  handsome  silver  soup-tureens. 

One  event  which  happened  towards  the  close  of  the 
season  1878-79  deserves  to  be  mentioned,  and  that  is  the 
death  of  that  famous  steeplechase  horse,  the  Doctor. 
He  ran  second  in  the  Grand  National  of  1870,  and 
when  a  turn  in  his  temper  rendered  him  useless  for 
steeplechasing,  he  was  made  over  to  Mr.  Custance  as 
a  hunter,  and  carried  him  brilliantly  for  several  seasons. 
As  that  famous  ex-jockey  writes  in  his  book,  published 
not  long-  ago  :  "  The  club-footed  horse  was  well  known 
in  Leicestershire  ;  no  fence  was  big  enough  to  stop  him, 
and    no   hounds   ran   too   fast   for   him.      His  end  came 


MR.    J.    COUPLAND  345 

through  his  breaking  his  shoulder  in  jumping  on  to  the 
stump  where  a  tree  had  been  cut  down." 

The  opening  day  of  1879-80  saw  the  Rev.  John 
Russell  at  Kirby  Gate.  He  was  then  something  like 
eighty-four  years  old,  and  had  journeyed  all  the  way 
from  Devonshire  to  obtain  an  insight  into  the  hunting 
countries  comprised  in  Leicestershire.  The  season  was 
only  a  few  days  old  when  a  well-known  Meltonian 
emulated  the  feat  of  Mr.  Thornton,  when  mounted  on 
the  famous  Hercules  (who,  as  John  Leech  showed  us  in 
"Mr.  Sponge's  Sporting  Tour,"  took  a  draper's  shop),  by 
his  horse  jumping  into  a  tobacconist's.  Although  much 
damage  was  done  to  the  stock-in-trade,  both  horse  and 
rider  escaped  injury. 

For  some  time  Mr.  Coupland's  health  had  been  none 
of  the  best,  and  he  had  been  out  of  the  saddle  for  some 
time,  but  in  January  1880  the  master  had  so  far  recovered 
as  to  be  able  to  take  the  field  again,  which  he  did  amidst 
the  congratulations  of  his  followers. 

By  the  year  1880  a  good  many  Leicestershire  hunt- 
ing men  had  probably  forgotten  the  existence  of  John 
Goddard,  whose  death  was  announced  in  September  of 
the  above-mentioned  year. 

In  the  following  year  the  Ouorn  Hunt  lost  a  very 
good  friend  in  Mr.  Andrew  Heseltine,  who  for  so  many 
years  lived  at  the  farmhouse  adjoining  the  famous  covert 
at  Gartree  Hill,  Little  Dalby.  Up  to  within  a  few  years 
of  his  death,  no  farmer  in  the  country  followed  hounds 
with  more  zest  than  he  did,  and  for  a  generation  he  was 
known  to  be  one  of  the  foremost  hunting  men.  He 
farmed  under  Mr.  E.  B.  Hartopp,  and  to  that  gentle- 
man's honour  be  it  said,  when  the  tide  of  fortune  turned 
against  his  old  tenant  with  his  increasing  years,  he  gave 
him  a  good  pension.  "  Old  Andrew,"  as  he  was  fami- 
liarly called,  was  one  of  the  staunchest  preservers  of 
foxes  in  the  covert  that  lay  almost  at  his  own  door,  and 


346  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

was  no  more  zealous  about  stock  than  he  was  about 
the  foxes  ;  and  if  ever  his  covert  was  drawn  blank  the 
old  man  was  terribly  upset.  For  many  years  his  house 
was  always  open  to  any  hunting  man  who  called,  and 
when,  through  failing  health,  he  was  no  longer  able  to 
hunt,  he  still  entertained  the  same  interest  for  the  sport 
as  in  the  days  when  he  was  capable  of  holding  his  own 
in  the  best  of  company. 

The  February  of  1 88 1  brought  with  it  the  announce- 
ment that  Mr.  Coupland  would  give  up  the  country  at 
the  end  of  the  season  owing  to  the  insufficient  amount 
of  subscriptions,  and  then  the  rumour  gained  ground  that 
the  Duke  of  Portland  would  be  his  successor.  This  was 
stated  in  the  Times,  but  at  a  meeting  held  shortly  after- 
wards it  was  authoritatively  stated  that  the  statement  was 
a  fabrication.  At  the  aforesaid  meeting  Sir  Frederick 
Fowke  took  the  chair,  and  stated  that  the  object  of  the 
meeting  was  to  see  if  sufficient  funds  could  not  be  raised 
to  obviate  the  necessity  of  so  popular  a  master  resigning. 
This,  by  the  way,  was  an  adjourned  meeting.  A  heavy 
debt  was  owing  to  Mr.  Coupland  for  the  covert  fund, 
and  it  was  said  that  if  ,£4500  a  year  could  be  raised 
Mr.  Coupland  would  continue  to  hunt  the  country. 
Among  various  suggestions  made  was  one  that  the 
fixtures  should  not  be  advertised,  and  this  view  appa- 
rently was  adopted  ;  for,  through  the  remainder  of 
Mr.  Coupland's  reign,  no  announcement  of  the  fixtures 
appeared  in  the  Leicester  Journal.  A  tenant  farmer  said 
that  he  and  his  friends  were  full  against  advertising; 
but  it  may  very  much  be  doubted  whether  the  suppres- 
sion of  the  announcement  of  fixtures  diminishes  the  field 
by  half-a-dozen.  If  any  one  happens  to  be  staying  in 
a  hunting  country,  it  is  not  difficult  to  find  out  where 
unadvertised  hounds  meet,  for  perhaps  the  worst  kept 
secret  is  the  names  of  the  places  at  which  a  pack  is 
due  during  the  week. 


MR.    J.    COUPLAND  347 

On  Tuesday  the  7th  of  March  18S2,  there  passed 
away  one  of  Melton's  brightest  stars,  one  of  Leicester- 
shire's best  sportsmen,  the  Earl  of  Wilton,  of  Egerton 
Lodge,  Melton  Mowbray,  where  he  died. 

His  career  in  the  world  of  sport  was  somewhat  unique  in 
its  way.  It  was  about  fifty  years  before  his  death  that  he  pur- 
chased Egerton  Lodge  from  Lord  Darlington  ;  but  for  nearly  ten 
years  before  that  the  earl  was  hunting  in  Leicestershire,  and  was 
still  a  bold  rider  to  hounds  when  his  eighty-second  birthday 
had  come  and  gone.  He  was  hunting  when  George  III.  ruled 
England,  and  he  was  hunting  during  the  season  1881-82.  The 
Earl  of  Wilton  was  born  on  the  30th  December  1799,  and  on  the 
turf  his  colours  were  registered  so  long  ago  as  1828,  though  they 
underwent  several  changes  down  to  the  year  1861. 

When  Lord  Wilton  first  began  to  make  his  mark  in  Leicester- 
shire, Sir  Henry  Peyton,  who,  together  with  his  son,  were  said 
to  be  the  equals  of  Mr.  Smith,  senior,  and  his  son  Assheton,  was 
a  well-known  performer  with  hounds  ;  while  Lord  Forester,  the 
fifth  Earl  of  Jersey,  Lord  Delamere,  Mr.  Edge,  the  great  friend 
of  Assheton  Smith,  and  Sir  Francis  Burdett  were  hunting  with 
the  Quorn,  and  perhaps  not  one  of  them  was  Lord  Wilton's 
superior  over  a  country.  He  was  built  for  a  horseman — 
"  attenuated  Wilton,"  Mr.  Bernal  Osborne  called  him  in  the 
"  Chaunt  of  Achilles";  his  hands  were  of  the  best,  and  not 
being  a  heavy  weight  he  had  a  great  predilection  for  thorough- 
bred horses,  and  for  some  seasons  he  rode  the  thoroughbred 
stallion  Thyrsis,  on  which  he  once  pounded  the  whole  of  the 
Belvoir  field  in  a  famous  run  from  Sproxton  Thorns.  His 
manner  of  riding  to  hounds  was  perfect ;  he  was  never  in  a 
hurry,  and  as  Dick  Christian  used  to  say,  when  other  first  flight 
men  found  their  horses  beaten,  Lord  Wilton  would  apparently 
just  begin  to  ride.  But  then  he  had  a  wonderful  eye  for  country; 
he  knew  every  fence  in  Leicestershire,  and  could  pick  out  the 
most  practicable  place  in  each.  The  story  has  been  told  how,  on 
hearing,  after  a  good  day,  some  of  those  who  had  taken  part 
in  it  describing  the  double  oxers  and  all  kinds  of  yawners  they 
had  jumped,  he  would  say,  "  Oh,  dear,  where  do  they  find  these 
terrible  places  ?  /  never  come  across  them."  The  fact,  how- 
ever, that  he  set  the  Belvoir,  as  just  now  mentioned,  would  serve 
to  show  that  he  did  sometimes  come  across  a  big  place — a  place 
big  enough,  at  all  events,  to  stop  everybody  else.     At  the  same 


348  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

time  it  must  be  remembered  that  Lord  Wilton  never  rode  bad 
horses ;  he  never  professed  to  lead  the  field  or  hold  a  good  place 
on  a  raw  four-year-old  or  a  poor  fencer.  In  his  best  stud-groom, 
Thomas  Godwin,  he  had  a  most  valuable  servant,  for  not  only 
did  he  turn  out  his  horses  in  excellent  condition,  but  he  saw  to 
the  schooling  of  as  many  as  did  not  quite  know  their  business. 
Godwin  was  born  in  1 786,  and  when  he  was  past  work,  was 
pensioned  off  at  Heaton  Park,  where  for  some  time,  during  the 
era  of  the  Heaton  Park  Races,  he  had  cleared  the  course  and 
acted  as  starter.  Lord  Wilton  sent  for  him  to  stay  at  Egerton 
Lodge,  and  there  the  old  man  breathed  his  last.  The  Heaton 
Park  Meeting  Lord  WTilton  established  in  his  own  domain  in  1827  ; 
and  he  was  himself  a  most  capable  jockey,  equal  to  holding  his 
own  against  most  of  those  so-called  amateur  riders  of  that  day, 
when  rules  were  less  stringent  than  it  has  since  been  found 
necessary  to  make  them.  As  an  instance  of  Lord  Wilton's 
prowess  in  the  saddle,  it  may  be  mentioned  that  between  the 
years  1843  and  1861  he  won  the  Granby  Handicap  at  Croxton 
Park  on  seven  occasions. 

On  the  death  of  Lord  Yarborough  the  Earl  of  Wilton  was 
elected  Commodore  of  the  Royal  Yacht  Squadron.  His  first 
yacht  was  the  Zarifa,  originally  a  slave  schooner ;  Lord  Wilton, 
after  using  her  for  some  seasons,  sold  her  to  go  to  Russia,  and 
she  was  wrecked  at  Sebastopol.  His  next  yacht  bore  the  same 
name  as  the  first,  and  selling  her  to  a  Liverpool  merchant,  he 
built  the  Zara  on  the  lines  of  the  America,  and  then,  like  many 
another  yachtsman,  he  abandoned  sail  power  for  steam,  his  last 
ship  being  the  steam  yacht  Palatine.  The  "Chaunt  of  Achilles" 
noted  the  many-sidedness  of  this  great  sportsman,  and  makes 
mention  of  the  fact  that  he  was  among  other  things  an  organist. 
The  Chaunt  was  written  about  the  year  1836,  and  whether  Lord 
Wilton  was  accustomed  then,  as  he  did  in  the  late  fifties  and 
early  sixties,  to  play  the  anthem  at  the  Chapel  Royal,  St.  James's, 
during  the  London  season,  I  do  not  know.  Under  Lord  Derby's 
administration,  Lord  Wilton  twice  held  the  post  of  State  Steward 
to  the  Queen.  Thomas  Grosvenor,  second  Earl  of  Wilton,  was 
the  second  son  of  Robert,  second  Earl  Grosvenor,  and  first 
Marquis  of  Westminster,  and  of  his  wife  Lady  Eleanor,  only 
daughter  of  Thomas,  first  Earl  of  Wilton.  Upon  the  death  of 
his  maternal  grandfather  in  1814,  the  Hon.  Thomas  Grosvenor 
succeeded  to  the  title  of  Earl  of  Wilton,  and  he  enjoyed  the 
possession  of  the  estates  for  a  period  of  sixty-eight  years.      In 


MR.    J.    COUPLAND  349 

1 82 1,  on  attaining  his  majority,  he  took  the  surname  and  arms 
of  Egerton.  When  the  first  Lord  Wilton  died,  his  grandson  and 
successor  was  at  Westminster  School,  and  on  leaving  there  he 
went  to  Christ  Church,  Oxford. 

Shortly  after  the  date  of  the  February  meeting,  Mr. 
Musters,  who  had  been  Mr.  Coupland's  predecessor, 
came  out  for  a  day  with  the  Quorn  near  Gaddesby,  and 
while  hounds  were  running  hard  held  a  foremost  place. 
After  landing  over  a  fence  his  horse  fell,  but  though  Mr. 
Musters  sustained  no  injury  from  the  downfall,  before  he 
could  regain  his  feet  he  was  jumped  on  by  somebody 
else,  and  left  insensible.  As  soon  as  he  came  to  himself 
he  made  his  way  to  Gaddesby,  whence  he  was  driven  to 
Syston  station,  and  though  no  bones  were  broken,  he 
was  much  bruised  and  shaken,  and  had  to  keep  to  his 
room  for  some  time. 

For  many  years  there  had  been  few  more  venerated 
names  than  that  of  Sir  Arthur  Grey  Hazelrigg,  and  the 
men  of  South  Leicestershire  so  fully  realised  their  in- 
debtedness to  so  good  a  sportsman,  who,  though  not  at 
that  time  a  follower  of  the  hounds,  was  most  enthusiastic 
in  the  cause  of  hunting,  that  they  determined  to  present 
him  with  a  testimonial.  The  subscription  was  limited 
to  a  couple  of  guineas,  and  money  came  in  so  plenti- 
fully that  two  very  handsome  silver  bowls  were  pur- 
chased, the  Hazelrigg  arms  being  engraven  upon  the 
shields,  while  the  bowls  themselves  bore  the  inscription  : 
"  Presented  to  Sir  Arthur  Grey  Hazelrigg,  Bart.,  by 
friends  hunting  in  South  Leicestershire."  One  might 
have  thought  that  the  presentation  would  have  been 
made  in  strictly  orthodox  form,  but  such  was  not  the 
case,  as  the  testimonial,  for  good  and  sufficient  reasons, 
was  forwarded  to  Moseley  Hall,  the  seat  of  the  recipient. 

About  the  same  time,  too,  Mr.  Adam  Arnst  painted 
a  portrait  of  Tom  Firr,  from  which  a  lithograph  portrait 
was  published  by  Messrs.  Benyon  &  Co.  of  Cheltenham. 


350  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

It  was  said  to  be  very  good,  and  was  eagerly  bought 
up.  As  already  mentioned,  Tom  Firr  was  never  a  first 
whip,  having  given  up  the  second  whip's  place  with 
Colonel  Anstruther  Thomson  to  become  huntsman  to 
the  North  Warwickshire. 

Some  of  the  quarry  people  in  Leicestershire  had 
many  years  before  proved  themselves  somewhat  inimical 
to  fox-hunting,  and  at  odd  times  they  do  not  appear  to 
have  improved.  In  the  spring  of  1883  a  number  of  men 
were  at  work,  and  as  a  Mr.  Leatham  was  trying  to  make 
his  way  out  of  a  spinney,  he  asked  a  group  of  the  quarry- 
men  where  he  could  find  the  best  place.  They  pointed 
out  a  spot,  which  they  said  would  be  all  right ;  so  taking 
their  advice,  he  sent  his  horse  at  a  somewhat  formidable 
fence,  and  landed  in  a  stone-pit  about  twenty  feet  deep, 
though  fortunately  neither  his  horse  nor  himself  suffered 
any  injury  ;  but  the  accident  might  have  been  a  very 
serious  one.  The  perpetrators  of  this  little  joke  gathered 
on  the  bank  at  the  top,  and  laughed  heartily  at  the  result 
of  taking  their  advice.1 

The  spring  of  1883  saw  the  completion  of  the  picture 
painted  to  the  order  of  Messrs.  Dickinson,  of  New  Bond 
Street,  "  A  Meet  of  the  Ouorn  Hounds  at  Baggrave 
Hall  "  (1881-82),  the  portraits  in  which  were  painted  by 
Mr.  J.  B.  Gibson,  who  just  before  had  been  responsible 
for  the  portraits  in  the  picture  of  "  A  Meet  of  the  Four- 
in-Hand  Driving  Club." 

Not  long  afterwards,  however,  the  Ouorn  Hunt  had 
to  lament  the  death  of  General  Burnaby,  whose  residence 
was  in  the  best  part  of  the  country,  and  who  was  instru- 
mental in  getting  the  Prince  of  Wales  to  plant  the  gorse 

1  In  strong  contrast  to  this  unsportsman-like  conduct  is  that  of  the  quarry- 
men  and  miners  in  Lord  Fitzwilliam's  Hunt,  who,  in  the  summer  of  1898, 
subscribed  to  purchase  for  Frank  Bartlett,  Lord  Fitzwilliam's  huntsman,  a 
case  of  the  best  Sheffield  cutlery,  which  they  presented  to  him  in  token  o 
the  esteem  in  which  he  was  held,  for  both  the  master  and  his  huntsman  are 
scrupulously  careful  in  showing  the  quarrymen  as  much  sport  as  possible. 


MR.    J.    COUPLAND  351 

which  bore  his  name  ;  while  all  the  Baggrave  coverts 
were  regarded  as  sure  finds,  and  had  over  and  over  again 
been  the  starting-points  of  good  gallops.  It  was  to  the 
Baggrave  coverts  that  most  masters  returned  if  sport 
failed  elsewhere.  General  Burnaby,  however,  never  did 
things  by  halves,  and  when  his  Parliamentary  duties 
became  absorbing  Baggrave  saw  but  little  of  him  ;  while 
his  coverts  were  not  so  well  tended  in  his  absence  as 
they  had  been  when  he  was  there  to  look  after  them.  It 
was  a  somewhat  curious  coincidence  that  the  general, 
who  was  such  a  strong  partisan  of  the  Quorn  Hunt,  was 
one  of  the  most  enthusiastic  in  voting  for  the  severance 
of  the  Billesdon  side  from  the  parent  country.  This  by 
no  means  suggests  that  he  was  wrong,  but  it  is  curious 
that  such  a  staunch  friend  of  the  Quorn  should  have 
been  in  favour  of  the  country  being  cut  in  two.  In  his 
younger  days  the  general  rode  well  to  hounds,  while 
there  was  no  more  hospitable  house  in  the  country  than 
Baggrave  Hall. 

Mention,  by  the  way,  of  the  Prince  of  Wales'  Gorse 
reminds  one  that  after  General  Burnaby's  death,  Mr. 
Trew,  who  rented  Baggrave,  offered  to  replant  the  gorse, 
which  had  failed,  at  his  own  cost.  The  guardians  of 
the  Baggrave  property  were  naturally  extremely  grateful 
to  Mr.  Trew  for  his  generous  offer,  but  knowing  the 
interest  that  the  late  General  Burnaby  had  always  taken 
in  that  covert,  thought  that  the  whole  recuperation  should 
be  undertaken  by  the  estate  in  as  efficient  a  manner  as 
possible,  the  trustees  being  quite  sure  that  they  would 
be  acting  in  accordance  with  what  would  have  been  the 
wishes  of  the  late  occupant ;  and  it  is  needless  to  say 
that  both  the  master  and  the  members  of  the  Hunt 
thanked  Mr.  Trew  very  heartily  for  his  most  sporting 
offer. 

If  the  end  of  the  year  1883  and  the  first  few  clays  of 
1884  were  not  marked  by  the  very  best  of  luck,  ample 


352  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

amends  were  made  just  afterwards  by  an  excellent  day's 
sport  on  Monday,  January  7.  In  the  morning  hounds 
ran  fast  for  fifty-three  minutes,  making  what  was  esti- 
mated a  six-mile  point ;  while  in  the  afternoon  they  ran 
hard  for  half-an-hour  without  anything  worthy  of  really 
being  called  a  check.  Nearly  every  horse  was  knocked 
up,  or  the  pursuit  might  have  been  continued.  Both 
runs  took  the  hounds  into  the  Belvoir  territory,  and  both 
were  run  over  a  splendid  country.  The  hounds  met  in 
the  morning  at  Old  Dalby,  among  those  present  being 
Mr.  Coupland,  Lady  Wilton,  Lady  Cardigan,  Lord 
Belper,  the  Messrs.  and  Miss  Chaplin,  the  Duke  of 
Portland,  Lord  Manners,  &c.  Neither  run,  however, 
ended  with  a  kill. 

Only  a  few  days  afterwards  Mr.  Hed worth  Barclay 
met  with  a  somewhat  severe  accident,  his  horse  falling 
at  a  big  fence,  and  rolling  over  its  rider,  who  clung  to 
the  reins,  while  the  horse,  in  his  endeavours  to  regain 
his  feet,  kicked  Mr.  Barclay  twice  on  the  head,  render- 
ing him  unconscious  ;  but  the  Ouorn  men  were  glad  to 
hear,  on  inquiry  the  next  day,  that  he  was  progressing 
favourably. 

At  this  time  (1884)  Lord  Lonsdale,  who  had  been 
for  a  short  time  master  of  the  Blankney,  met  by  invita- 
tion at  Scraptoft  Hall,  in  the  Quorn  country,  the  hounds, 
men,  and  horses  travelling  by  special  train  to  Leicester. 
The  Blankney  hounds  had  been  bought  by  Lord  Lons- 
dale from  Mr.  Chaplin,  and  represented  what  careful 
breeding  had  done  for  the  pack  handed  over  by  Lord 
Henry  Bentinck.  The  first  item  of  the  day  was  a  run 
with  a  ringing  fox  from  Scraptoft  Gorse,  and  he  went 
to  ground  between  Scraptoft  and  Billesdon  Coplow. 
Another  fox  found  at  the  Coplow  gave  a  gallop  to  the 
Cottesmore  Woods.  The  pack  had  a  good  deal  of  the 
fun  to  themselves  ;  but  near  Tilton  Wood  a  fresh  fox 
jumped  up  in  a  fallow,  and  him  they  drove  through  the 


MR.    J.    COUPLAND  353 

chain  of  coverts  as  far  as  Launde  Wood,  which  was 
reached  in  about  fifty  minutes.  Forcing  him  out  of  the 
covert,  they  swung  to  the  right,  and  bearing  round  by 
Loddington,  clashed  with  Sir  Bache  Cunard's  hounds, 
which  were  also  running  hard,  the  two  packs  going  on 
for  some  distance  under  the  leadership  of  Lord  Lons- 
dale ;  but  so  many  foxes  were  on  foot  that  presently 
hounds  were  whipped  off. 

The  close  of  the  season  1883-84  saw  the  end  of  the 
successful  mastership  of  Mr.  Coupland,  and  so  much  had 
his  efforts  to  show  sport  been  appreciated,  that  it  was  at 
once  resolved  to  present  him  with  a  testimonial.  The 
subscription  was  limited  to  £$,  and  the  circular  was 
signed  by  the  Duke  of  Portland,  Lord  Wilton,  and  the 
Hon.  Mr.  Curzon,  M.P.  ;  and  when  the  Ouorn  met  at 
Mr.  Ernest  Chaplin's  house,  Brooksby  Hall,  on  Friday, 
January  30,  advantage  was  taken  of  the  occasion  to 
present  Mr.  Coupland  with  a  silver  dinner-service. 

In  April  1884  a  meeting  of  the  Hunt  was  held  at  the 
Bell  Hotel,  Leicester,  to  consider  what  was  to  be  done 
in  the  way  of  finding  a  successor.  It  appeared  that  one 
offer  only  had  been  received,  and  that  was  from  Lord 
Manners.  His  lordship's  terms  were  that  the  kennels  at 
Quorn  should  be  put  into  proper  repair ;  that  he  should 
have  a  subscription  of  ^2500  a  year;  and  that  there 
should  be  a  covert  fund  of  ^"1500  a  year,  under  the 
control  of  a  committee  appointed  for  that  purpose, 
who  would  pay  covert  rents,  damages,  poultry  bill,  &c. 
Lord  Manners  confessed  that  he  would  rather  have 
the  disbursing  of  the  covert  fund  in  his  own  hands, 
but,  understanding  that  the  feeling  of  the  committee 
ran  in  an  opposite  direction,  he  would  not  press  it, 
and,  on  the  proposition  of  Lord  Wilton,  the  offer  was 
accepted. 

Mr.   Knight  made  a  somewhat  practical  suggestion, 
that    there    should    be    a    special    fund    to    provide    for 

z 


354 


THE    QUORN    HUNT 


compensating  small  farmers  for  the  damage  sustained 
by  them.  He  said  he  knew  certain  men  who  were 
occupying  from  thirty  to  forty  acres  apiece  to  suffer 
annually  to  the  extent  of  about  ^10.  They  received 
nothing  in  return,  and  he  rather  feared  that  unless 
something  were  done  for  them  they  would  not  feel 
inclined  to  put  up  with  the  loss  for  very  much  longer, 
in  which  event  wire  might  be  found  throughout  the 
district. 

At  this  same  meeting  Mr.  Praed  proposed  a  vote  of 
thanks  to  Mr.  Coupland  for  his  long  and  valuable  ser- 
vices as  master  of  the  Ouorn,  a  proposition  which,  it  is 
needless  to  say,  was  carried  unanimously,  for  Mr.  Coup- 
land  had  shown  excellent  sport,  and  was  most  popular 
with  all  classes.  In  the  spring  of  this  same  year  (1884) 
the  ex-master's  horses  were  sold  by  Messrs.  Warner, 
Shephard,  &  Wade  at  Leicester,  when  twenty-five  were 
sold  at  an  average  of  £80,  14s. 


CHAPTER    XII 

LORD   MANNERS    (1884-1886) 
CAPTAIN    WARNER    (1886-1890) 
EARL    OF    LONSDALE 


355 


CHAPTER    XII 

LORD      MANNERS 

1884-1886 

AS  already  mentioned,  Lord  Manners,  who  won  the 
L  Grand  National  in  1882  on  his  own  horse  Seaman, 
succeeded  Mr.  Coupland,  and  about  his  first  official  duty 
was  to  preside  at  the  puppy  show  held  at  the  end  of 
August  1884.  There  had  been  some  talk  of  removing 
the  kennels  to  another  spot,  but  eventually  it  was  deter- 
mined they  should  remain  at  Quorn,  and,  in  accordance 
with  Lord  Manners's  wish,  the  committee  spent  about 
^1600  in  repairing  damages,  &c,  and  when  the  puppy 
show  was  held  the  work  was  hardly  completed.  Lord 
Ferrers,  Frank  Gillard  of  the  Belvoir,  and  G.  Shepherd 
of  the  South  Notts,  were  the  judges,  the  young  entry 
consisting  of  six  and  a  half  couples  of  dogs  and  eight 
and  a  half  couples  of  bitches.  Lord  Manners  gave  the 
usual  luncheon,  and  a  very  pleasant  afternoon  was  spent. 

It  was  just  about  this  time  that  the  wise  deter- 
mination was  arrived  at  of  securing  the  hounds  for  the 
country.1 

Mention  has  been  made  more  than  once  of  the 
clashing  of  packs,  and  towards  the  end  of  December 
1884  the  Quorn  and  the  Belvoir  had  a  run  together  which 
has  probably  not  yet  been  forgotten  by  those  who 
happened  to  take  part  in  it.  The  Quorn  hounds  met 
at  Ellar's  Gorse,  and  the  Belvoir  at  Harby  ;  both  packs 

1  See  page  30. 
357 


358  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

ran  fast,  the  Ouorn  via  Sherbroke  Covert,  and  the  Bel- 
voir  in  the  vale  by  the  Curate's  Gorse.  At  Flint  Hill 
Spinney  it  was  that  both  packs  met,  there  being  two 
foxes  in  covert.  Whether  a  fresh  fox  jumped  up,  or 
whether  both  packs  went  away  with  one  of  the  hunted 
foxes,  is  not  certain  ;  but  a  rattling  good  gallop  took 
place  from  a  spinney  to  Dalby  Osier-bed,  where  the  fox 
was  pulled  down,  the  two  packs  having  run  together  for 
about  forty  minutes,  and  each  having  made  something 
like  a  seven-mile  point. 

Lord  Manners's  short  mastership  was  unfortunately 
marked  on  the  whole  by  a  bad  scenting-time.  Some 
good  runs,  of  course,  took  place,  but  as  a  rule  scent  was 
indifferent ;  while  he  was  confronted  by  another  diffi- 
culty, as  for  a  year  or  two  before  he  took  the  hounds 
scent  had  lain  so  well  that  nearly  all  the  old  foxes  had 
been  killed  off.  As  every  one  knows,  without  a  certain 
proportion  of  elders  really  good  sport  is  next  to  im- 
possible, young  foxes  never  running,  as  a  rule,  quite  so 
boldly  as  the  older  ones,  especially  on  good  scenting- 
days  ;  and  it  is  stated  that  the  bulk  of  those  in  the 
country  when  Lord  Manners  took  the  hounds  simply 
ran  about  in  circles,  after  the  manner  of  hares. 

It  should  have  been  mentioned  before  that  when 
Lord  Manners  became  master  it  was  resolved  to  ad- 
vertise on  no  more  than  three  days  a  week,  the  Friday 
fixture  being  kept  a  secret,  in  order  to  try  to  avoid  the 
crowd  ;  though,  as  already  remarked,  it  may  be  doubted 
whether  the  new  departure  appreciably  diminished  the 
fields. 

In  1884  Tom  Firr  had  the  misfortune  to  break  his 
collar-bone  ;  while  in  the  summer  of  the  next  year  Lei- 
cestershire had  to  lament  the  death  of  Major  Clagett, 
who  was  well  known  with  the  Quorn,  although  perhaps 
he  was  more  often  out  with  the  Cottesmore.  He  re- 
turned from   India  in   1864,  married  the  widow  of  Lord 


LORD    MANNERS  359 

Harborough,  and  took  up  his  residence  at  Stapleford 
Park,  near  Melton  Mowbray,  a  place  which  for  many 
years,  it  may  be  remembered,  had  been  not  only  rigo- 
rously closed  against  foxhounds,  but  had  its  coverts 
studded  with  dog-spears.  Lady  Harborough,  however, 
removed  these  engines,  and  gave  the  hounds  free  access 
to  the  coverts. 

In  the  first  year  of  Lord  Manners's  mastership 
there  died,  at  Eastwell  Rectory,  a  sporting  clergyman 
who  was  reverenced  throughout  the  length  and  breadth 
of  Leicestershire,  the  Rev.  Edward  Bullen,  who  was 
in  his  eighty-ninth  year  at  the  time  of  his  death.  At 
the  age  of  five  years  he  followed  his  father's  harriers 
on  a  pony,  and  then  for  more  than  eighty  years  he  was 
an  ardent  follower  of  the  Quorn.  In  his  heaviest 
days  he  never  scaled  more  than  nine  stone,  so  he  had 
no  difficulty  in  mounting  himself,  and  being  a  super- 
lative horseman,  whatever  he  rode  carried  him  to  the 
front.  One  of  his  horses  was  a  chestnut,  which  roared 
like  a  bull,  but  carried  him  through  deep  ground  and 
over  any  fence  which  intervened.  In  fact  he  was  really 
a  horse  whose  noise  did  not  stop  him. 

It  should  not  be  left  unsaid  that  Lord  Manners,  in 
his  last  year  of  mastership,  came  to  the  front  in  making 
Adam's  Gorse  a  better  covert  than  perhaps  it  had  ever 
been  before.  When  Sir  Richard  Sutton  guided  the 
fortunes  of  the  Ouorn  there  were  several  unconnected 
patches  of  gorse,  at  no  great  distance,  surrounding  a 
spinney  near  Ashby  Folville,  and  hence  it  was  that  the 
covert  was  called  a  gorse.  These  patches,  however, 
being  unfenced,  the  cattle  exterminated  them,  and  even- 
tually only  a  few  straggling  plants  were  to  be  seen. 
For  several  years,  therefore,  there  was  no  shelter  for  a 
fox,  except  in  a  somewhat  hollow  spinney,  and  the  term 
"  gorse,"  when  that  gorse  was  broken  down,  was  certainly 
a  misnomer.      Then   Lord   Manners  came  forward,   and 


360  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

with  the  consent  of  Mr.  Parry,  who  owned  the  place,  had 
enclosed  at  his  own  expense  three  or  four  acres  of 
ground  and  sowed  them  with  gorse.  The  enclosure  was 
away  from  the  road,  sheltered  and  surrounded  on  every 
side,  and  it  seemed  a  most  desirable  covert  for  foxes  to 
take  up  their  abode  in. 

On  New  Year's  Day,  in  Lord  Manners's  last  year  of 
mastership,  a  somewhat  peculiar  accident  occurred  at 
Syston,  which  happily  was  not  attended  with  the  fatal 
results  which  might  very  easily  have  been  its  accompani- 
ment. A  couple  of  hunting  men  were  returning  home 
after  a  good  run,  and  were  jogging  along  at  the  rate  of 
about  six  miles  an  hour,  the  one  on  the  road,  the  other 
on  the  footpath,  a  crime  for  which  he  might  now  be 
severely  punished  by  the  authorities.  A  vehicle  drawn 
by  one  horse  passed  the  two  riders  and  shortly  after- 
wards came  into  collision  with  a  carriage,  the  evening 
being  very  dark.  One  wheel  of  the  carriage  was  knocked 
completely  off,  the  occupants  being  thrown  out,  and  the 
horse  then  rushed  off  with  the  shafts  dangling  at  its 
hocks.  A  little  further  on  it  came  into  collision  with  the 
horse  of  the  man  who  was  riding  in  the  road,  and  the 
shock  was  so  great — it  being  what  the  Americans  would 
term  a  "  head-end  collision  " — that  the  necks  of  both 
horses  were  broken,  both  falling  dead  together  in  the 
middle  of  the  road.  Neither  the  rider  nor  driver, 
however,  was  too  much  hurt  to  be  taken  to  his  respective 
home  in  a  cab. 


CAPTAIN    WARNER  361 


CAPTAIN    WARNER 

1886-1890 

ON  the  retirement  of  his  predecessor  it  was  certainly 
in  the  fitness  of  things  that  Captain  Warner 
should  be  Lord  Manners's  successor,  as  his  father  had 
sometime  previously  purchased  the  historic  Ouorndon 
Hall.  The  customary  meeting  of  members  was  held  at 
the  Bell  Hotel,  Leicester,  during  April,  for  the  purpose 
of  appointing  Lord  Manners's  successor,  Sir  Fre- 
derick Fowke  again  finding  himself  in  the  presidential 
chair,  when  the  announcement  he  had  to  make  was  that 
Captain  Warner  had  offered  to  take  over  the  Ouorn 
hounds  on  the  same  terms  as  the  late  master  had  done, 
that  is  to  say,  on  a  subscription  of  ^"4000  a  year,  ,£2500 
to  be  paid  to  the  master,  and  ^1500  for  the  poultry 
claims  and  covert  fund,  &c.  The  committee  recom- 
mended that  Captain  Warner's  offer  should  be  accepted, 
and  the  motion  was  carried  with  only  one  dissentient. 

Then  it  was  that  Mr.  W.  F.  Miles  rose  to  his  feet 
and,  alluding  to  a  meeting  of  farmers  which  had  been 
held  a  day  or  two  before,  asked  if  Captain  Warner 
was  aware  of  what  had  been  done.  Some  discussion 
followed,  and  then  a  letter,  written  by  Mr.  Thomas 
Nuttall,  one  of  the  farmers  in  question,  was  read  by 
the  chairman.  The  material  parts  of  the  letter  were  as 
follows  : — 

That  this  meeting,  whilst  desirous  of  promoting  the  best 
interests  of  fox-hunting,  protests  against  the  appointment  of  any 
master,  until  they  are  in  possession  of  the  balance-sheet  for  the 


362  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

last  two  years,  to  guide  them  in  the  conditions  necessary  to  such 
appointment ;  and  they  also  insist  that  in  future  at  least  one-third 
of  the  Hunt  Committee  shall  consist  of  occupiers,  whose  support 
to  fox-hunting  is  far  greater  than  that  from  any  other  class, 
entitling  them  to  a  share  in  the  management  of  matters  belonging 
to  the  Hunt.  A  list  of  proposed  names  is  attached  for  selection. 
I  am  requested  to  ask  you  to  lay  this  before  the  meeting,  and  also 
to  urge  the  desirability  of  adjourning  the  appointment  until  these 
matters  are  settled,  and  so  preventing  any  unpleasantness  to  the 
new  master. 

On  January  5  following  the  farmers  of  the  Ouorn 
country  again  held  a  meeting  to  consider  their  position 
in  reference  to  the  new  management,  the  gathering  taking 
place  at  the  Bell  Hotel,  Leicester,  Mr.  Nuttall  aforesaid 
beino;  in  the  chair. 

He  said  he  was  perfectly  aware  that  the  subject  required  very 
delicate  handling,  as  some  of  them  knew  that  the  steps  which  had 
been  taken  in  the  movement  had  been  represented  as  antagonistic 
to  the  interests  of  fox-hunting  ;  but,  in  order  to  show  that  such 
was  not  the  case,  he  would  move  "  That  this  meeting  begs  first  to 
record  its  strong  desire  to  promote  the  best  interests  of  fox- 
hunting, and  to  take  such  steps  as  to  insure  its  long-continued 
popularity  with  all  classes."  His  argument  was  that  the  occupiers 
of  land  contributed  their  share  to  the  funds  of  the  Hunt,  and  they 
had  a  right  to  know  how  the  money  was  expended.  He  contended 
further  that  their  contributions  as  occupiers  were  equal  to  that  of 
the  largest  subscriber,  who  enjoyed  four  or  five  months'  hunting  in 
return  for  his  money.  If,  therefore,  they  contributed  equally  to 
the  funds,  they  were  equally  entitled  to  the  privileges  of  the  sub- 
scribers, and  they  only  asked  the  committee,  in  the  most  friendly 
spirit,  that  their  interests  should  be  represented  on  that  com- 
mittee. He  was  glad  to  see  Mr.  Paget  present,  and  hoped  he 
would  tell  them  that  the  movement  had  been  met  in  a  friendly 
spirit.  No  one,  he  said,  was  so  much  interested  in  fox-hunting  as 
the  farmers,  and  who  ought  to  know  better  than  the  farmer  when 
the  sport  ought  to  commence  and  when  it  should  finish  ?  and  who 
was  more  competent  than  the  farmer  to  meet  his  brother  occupier 
to  discuss  vexatious  claims  ?  He  thought  that  if  the  occupiers  of 
land  had  some  standing  they  would  be  able  to  deal  with  many  of 


CAPTAIN    WARNER  363 

the  claim  questions  which  would  otherwise  have  to  come  before 
the  committee. 

Mr.  W.  B.  Paget,  as  representative  of  the  Quorn  Hunt  Com- 
mittee, said  that  every  claim  which  had  been  sent  to  the  committee 
had  been  settled,  and  he  could  assure  the  meeting  that  it  was  the 
wish  of  the  committee  to  give  every  attention  to  the  claims,  both 
for  poultry  and  damage;  while  the  Hunt  Committee  was  anxious 
that  the  old  committee,  which  consisted  of  tenant  farmers,  should 
be  revived,  as  they  agreed  with  Mr.  Nuttall  that  it  would  be  of 
immense  assistance  in  the  settlement  of  claims. 

Mr.  Nuttall's  motion  was  then  carried  unanimously. 

Mr.  Bonnell  then  moved  that,  in  consequence  of  the  large 
numbers  hunting  in  Leicestershire,  it  was  desirable  that  the 
occupiers  of  land  should  have  a  share  in  the  general  manage- 
ment of  the  Hunt  through  representatives  on  the  committee, 
and  that  was  also  agreed  to. 

Meanwhile  Captain  Warner  had  purchased  the  best 
of  Lord  Manners's  horses,  while  the  stable  was  strength- 
ened with  a  good  many  new  purchases,  several  of  them 
coming  from  Ireland. 

Before  cub-hunting  was  fairly  in  swing,  an  alteration 
in  the  days  of  hunting  was  put  on  its  trial.  The  custom 
had  been  for  some  time  to  hunt  the  country  south  of  the 
Wreake  on  Friday  and  that  on  the  north  on  Monday, 
but  it  was  then  proposed  to  reverse  that  order  of  things. 
This,  however,  was  not  altogether  a  novelty,  but  merely 
a  return  to  an  arrangement  which  had  been  in  vogue 
fourteen  or  fifteen  years  before. 

In  December  1886  the  death  was  announced  of  that 
well-known  sportsman,  Captain  Horatio  Ross,  who  was 
born  at  Rossie  Castle,  in  Forfarshire,  in  1801,  and 
died  at  his  home,  Rossie  Lodge,  Inverness,  early  in 
December. 

Lord  Nelson  was  his  godfather,  hence  his  name  Horatio.  He 
was  gazetted  to  a  dragoon  regiment,  but  left  the  army  before  he 
was  twenty-five,  and  took  up  his  residence  at  Melton  Mowbray, 
then  in  the  zenith  of  its  fame  when  Captain  Ross  saw  it  for  the 


364  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

first  time.  His  friend  and  frequent  rival,  Squire  Osbaldeston,  was 
then  master  of  the  Quorn.  His  doings  on  horseback  are  well 
known,  and  he  was  one  of  the  first  to  encourage  steeplechasing. 
As  a  deerstalker  and  rifle-shot  it  is  unnecessary  to  say  more  of 
Captain  Ross,  and  for  several  years  he  was  a  well-known  atten- 
dant in  Leicestershire,  was  exceedingly  keen  on  hunting,  and  was 
bad  to  beat  over  any  country. 

The  year  1886  went  out  with  a  frost  which  lasted 
for  something  like  six  weeks,  and  when  hunting  again 
became  possible,  that  is  to  say  on  Monday,  January  24, 
when  the  hounds  met  at  Baggrave,  the  huntsman  broke 
his  collar-bone,  and  for  some  little  time,  until  he  was 
ready  to  take  the  saddle  again,  the  first  whipper-in 
hunted  the  pack,   and  with  considerable  success. 

On  Friday,  January  28,  the  hounds  met  at  Ratcliffe-on-the- 
Wreake,  and  after  a  short  ring  from  Cossington  Gorse,  found 
another  fox  at  Thrussington  Gorse.  A  third  one  went  away  from 
Ragdale  Wood,  and  for  forty-five  minutes  he  ran  in  a  circle 
by  Schoby  Scholes.  The  first  whipper-in,  who  was  still  acting  as 
huntsman,  viewed  his  fox,  when  a  fresh  one  jumped  up  out  of  a 
patch  of  gorse,  but  soon  afterwards  the  pack  was  taken  home. 
Two  hounds,  evidently  making  a  short  cut,  dashed  through  a 
hollow  in  the  woods  on  to  a  frozen  piece  of  water,  but  the  ice 
proved  to  be  thin  in  the  middle,  and  one  of  the  hounds  was 
unfortunately  drowned. 

Just  as  the  cub-hunting  season  (1887-88)  was  getting 
towards  its  last,  the  death  was  announced  of  an  old 
follower  of  the  Quorn,  whose  name  was  once  a  house- 
hold word  in  the  country,  but  who  might  have  been 
forgotten  by  many  who  were  with  the  hounds  in  1887. 

This  was  Mr.  Walter  James  Little  Gilmour,  who  was  born  so 
long  ago  as  1806,  and  who  died  on  Friday,  December  3,  1887. 
He  was  a  Scotchman,  and  early  in  life  came  into  a  clear  income  of 
about  .£12,000  a  year,  of  which  he  spent  comparatively  little,  and 
when  he  gave  up  hunting  retired  to  his  house  in  North  Bank, 
St.  John's  Wood,  London,  where  he  spent  still  less ;   and  during 


CAPTAIN    WARNER  365 

this  time  his  savings  must  have  been  immense.  "Nimrod's" 
Quarterly  Review  run  brings  in  Mr.  Little  Gilmour,  who  was  only 
twenty  years  of  age  in  1826,  a  year  before  Mr.  Osbaldeston  gave 
up  his  second  period  of  mastership  with  the  Quorn.  The  account 
of  that  famous  run,  however,  is  purely  a  fancy  composition,  and, 
as  a  matter  of  fact,  Mr.  Gilmour  did  not  hunt  in  Leicestershire 
when  Mr.  Osbaldeston  was  master;  he  did  not  visit  the  shires 
until  Lord  Southampton's  time,  and  then  in  1829  he  was  a  member 
of  Lord  Rokeby's  Club  at  Melton  Mowbray,  one  of  his  colleagues 
being  Lord  Eglinton,  the  owner  of  the  Flying  Dutchman  and  the 
organiser  of  the  famous  Eglinton  tournament. 

In  Sir  Francis  Grant's  Quorn  picture,  painted  about  1840,  he 
figures  too.  In  the  centre  is  Lady  Wilton,  sister  of  a  former  Earl 
of  Derby,  seated  in  her  phaeton,  while  Lord  Wilton,  Count 
d'Orsay,  the  Duke  of  Beaufort,  the  then  Duke  of  Rutland  (at  that 
time  Marquis  of  Granby),  Lords  Chesterfield,  Plymouth,  Cardigan, 
Alvanley,  Adolphus  Fitzclarence,  Sir  Francis  Burdett,  Sir  David 
Baird,  Sir  Harry  Goodricke,  and  many  others  are  also  depicted. 
Of  all  this  brilliant  band  of  horsemen,  except  the  Duke  of 
Rutland,  Mr.  Little  Gilmour  was  the  last  survivor. 

It  may  be  remembered  that  Mr.  Gilmour  and  Captain  Ross 
once  opposed  each  other  in  a  curious  kind  of  steeplechase.  By 
the  terms  of  the  match  each  of  the  antagonists  was  to  touch  the 
other  with  his  hunting-whip,  and  with  the  one  who  succeeded  in 
touching  the  other  first  victory  was  to  rest.  They  dodged  about 
for  some  distance,  and  then  Mr.  Gilmour,  who  was  eventually  the 
winner,  managed  to  touch  Captain  Ross's  hat.  In  the  evening  a 
great  dinner  was  given  to  celebrate  the  event. 

Three  of  Mr.  Gilmour's  best  horses,  named  Vingt-et-Un, 
Plunder,  and  Lord  Grey,  were  said  by  Dick  Christian  to  be 
amongst  the  best  horses  he  had  ever  seen  cross  Leicestershire, 
and,  said  the  famous  rough-rider,  "upon  Lord  Grey,  Mr.  Little 
Gilmour,  with  sixteen  stone  of  top  hamper  in  the  saddle,  beat 
every  one  last  season  (1856)  in  a  hot  thing  from  Sproxton  to 
Harby." 

Mr.  Gilmour  was  a  contemporary,  amongst  others,  of 
Mr.  Stirling  Crawford,  and  that  gentleman,  with  whom 
Mr.  Gilmour  was  on  terms  of  the  deepest  affection,  paid 
him  the  compliment  of  naming  one  of  his  best  horses 
Craigmillar,  which,  it  may  be  remembered,  was  one  of 
the  sires  at  the  late  Mr.  Hume  Webster's   Marden   Park 


366  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

Stud.  Craigmillar  Castle  was  part  of  the  Gilmour 
property. 

The  season  of  1887-88  opened  as  usual  at  Kirby 
Gate,  when,  in  spite  of  the  crowd,  a  very  decent  run 
ensued,  the  pack  making  a  point  of  something  like  eight 
miles,  while  for  the  first  thirty  minutes  hounds  ran  hard. 
The  best  part  of  the  gallop,  however,  was  really  seen  by 
three  only,  and  for  that  piece  of  good  luck  they  ought  to 
have  been,  and  undoubtedly  were,  thankful.  Several 
foxes  were  found  at  Gartree  Hill,  but  the  one  to  which 
the  hounds  were  "engaged"  was  not  long  in  going  to 
ground.  Then  they  drew  Burrough  Hill  Spinney,  a 
covert  from  which  nobody  perhaps  remembered  a  run 
taking  place  ;  but  on  this  occasion  there  was  a  fox  at 
home,  and  he  showed  the  run  of  the  day. 

On  the  whole,  the  season  of  1887-88  was  about 
the  worst  on  record,  but  in  March  a  good  run  or  two 
took  place  by  way  of  redemption.  The  season,  how- 
ever, was  not  destined  to  come  to  an  end  without  some 
accidents,  and  in  February,  when  the  Quorn  hounds 
were  running  between  Bunny  and  Clifton,  while  cross- 
ing the  farm  of  Mr.  Gunn,  near  Ruddington,  Mr. 
Barker,  who  was  riding  a  little  way  behind  Tom  Firr, 
rode  at  a  dead  fence  through  which  a  wire  ran  ;  the 
huntsman,  taught  by  previous  experience,  and  blessed 
with  a  keen  eye,  had  the  good  luck,  it  was  said,  to  see 
the  wire,  and  called  to  two  others  to  pull  up.  Mr. 
Barker,  however,  unfortunately  did  not  hear  the  timely 
warning,  as,  when  two  other  members  of  the  field 
galloped  up,  they  found  him  lying  on  the  ground  in  an 
insensible  condition.  Another  accident  occurred  to  Mrs. 
Murray  Smith,  sister  of  Lord  Belper,  whose  shoulder 
was  put  out. 

The  following  June  saw  Lord  Combermere,  Captain 
the  Hon.  F.  Johnston,  and  Mr.  E.  P.  Rawnsley  the 
judges  at  Peterborough  Show,  at  which  the  Ouorn  were 


CAPTAIN    WARNER  367 

represented  ;  nor  did  they  go  empty  away.  They  took 
second  prize  for  the  best  couple  of  entered  hounds,  and 
their  Warrior  gained  the  stallion  hound  prize.  They 
then  scored,  perhaps  rather  fortunately,  another  victory, 
when  the  first  prize  was  given  to  two  couples  of  their 
young  bitches,  while  the  Quorn  Fragrance  won  in  the 
single  puppy  class.  The  Quorn  rather  easily  beat  the 
Fitzwilliam  in  the  class  for  older  bitches  with  Gladness 
by  Grasper,  Gambol  by  Rufford  Galliard,  Graceless  by 
Galliard,  and  Paragon  by  Grasper.  There  were  two 
more  cups  to  be  won,  and  the  Quorn  carried  off  both; 
so  altogether  Tom  Firr  and  the  master  did  very  well 
at  Peterborough  in  188S.  Nor  must  it  be  left  unsaid 
that  the  Quorn  Warrior  won  the  champion  cup  given 
by  the  Mayor  of  Peterborough. 

In  the  following  December  (1888)  the  Quorn  enjoyed  a  run 
from  Burrough  Hill  Wood,  which  was  said  to  be  about  the  best 
day's  sport  that  the  Quorn  had  seen  since  the  season  of  1883-84. 
Three  or  four  couples  of  hounds  hit  off  the  line  at  once,  forcing 
the  fox  into  the  road,  and  up  the  opposite  hill,  bending  slowly  to 
the  left  and  then  to  the  right,  after  which  they  ran  down  the 
valley  over  a  good  country.  There  was  a  momentary  check  in 
the  lane  above  Thorpe  Satchville,  which  gave  those  in  the  second 
rank  time  to  improve  their  position,  and  then  away  went  the 
hounds  on  the  lower  side  of  Adam's  Gorse.  They  were  out  of 
sight  for  a  moment  or  two,  and  then  they  were  viewed  racing 
up  the  hill.  In  another  half  mile  the  Burrough  and  Twyford 
road  was  reached,  just  where  the  line  branches  oft"  to  Tilton. 
About  a  dozen  men  were  there  with  the  hounds,  and  a  little  way 
beyond  Newbold  the  huntsman  viewed  the  fox  in  the  next  field. 
Hounds  were  soon  after  him,  but  the  fox  was  coursed  by  a  sheep- 
dog, and  a  check  took  place  for  something  like  twenty  minutes. 
Hounds  had  been  going  at  their  best  pace  over  a  big  country, 
but  when  the  collie  joined  in  the  hunt  the  fox  made  a  curve 
towards  Somerby,  but  he  again  reached  the  valley,  and  when  on 
his  original  line  he  kept  steadily  on  for  his  point,  which  proved 
to  be  the  spinney  at  Knossington.  After  the  check,  however, 
hounds  never  ran  very  hard,  but  made  the  most  of  a  failing  scent, 
and  whenever  occasion  served  drove  him  forward  at  a  good  pace. 


368  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

At  Knossington  another  fox  turned  to  the  right,  and  shortly  after- 
wards the  end  of  the  run  came  in  Little  Owston  Wood,  where  so 
many  fresh  foxes  were  on  foot  that  it  was  impossible  to  pick  out 
the  hunted  one. 

The  Quorn  finished  the  year  1888  with  a  hunting  run 
of  an  hour  and  forty  minutes  after  meeting  at  Great 
Dalby.  Gartree  Hill,  the  starting-point  of  the  run,  had 
not  been  drawn  since  the  hounds  met  at  Kirby  Gate,  and 
as  plenty  of  rain  had  fallen  overnight,  there  appeared  to 
be  every  chance  of  a  good  scent ;  but  the  expectation 
was  not  more  than  half  realised,  for  hounds  could  hunt 
their  fox  steadily  and  no  more,  except  during  those  few 
minutes  which  enter  into  nearly  all  hunting  runs,  when 
hounds  do  manage  a  short  burst  now  and  then.  Friday 
the  25th  January  brought  with  it  a  good  day's  sport. 
Meeting  at  Rearsby,  there  were  two  short  spins,  one  from 
Cream  Gorse  and  the  other  from  Ashby  Pastures,  both 
ending  at  the  same  drain.  Thorpe  Trussels  was  then 
drawn,  and  a  fox  found  there  gave  a  good  run  of  an  hour 
and  fifty  minutes.  During  the  remainder  of  the  season 
several  more  good  runs  took  place  ;  and  a  gallop  which 
came  off  on  Friday,  February  7,  1890,  from  Barkly  Holt 
to  Hoby  Rectory,  is  only  mentioned  because  hounds  had 
not  run  that  line  for  several  years. 

On  the  21st  March  1890,  while  hounds  were  running 
from  Great  Dalby,  a  fatal  accident  occurred  which  cast 
a  gloom  over  the  whole  of  Leicestershire,  as  Captain 
Barclay,  of  Scraptoft  Hall,  the  "Toots"  Barclay  of  many 
friends,  was  the  victim.  In  the  course  of  the  run  a  high 
fence  into  a  road  was  encountered,  and  the  Captain's 
horse  cleared  the  fence  fairly  well,  but  stumbling  on 
landing  through  his  forefeet  getting  on  to  an  awkward 
bank,  threw  his  rider  with  such  violence  on  his  head  that 
Captain  Barclay's  neck  was  broken,  and  he  was  found 
to  be  quite  dead  on  some  of  the  field  at  once  going  to 
the  immediate  assistance  of  the  unfortunate  gentleman. 


CAPTAIN    WARNKR  369 

Captain   Barclay  was  brother  to  Mr.  H.  T.  Barclay,  the 
owner  of  that  grand  horse  Bendigo. 

•When  the  Ouorn  met  at  Brooksby  Hall  on  the  14th 
March  1890,  they  bade  adieu  to  Mr.  Ernest  Chaplin, 
who  was  about  to  leave  the  country.  Until  about  the 
year  1896  he  was  one  of  the  hardest  men  with  the  Ouorn, 
but  at  that  time  a  bad  accident  put  a  stop  to  his  riding, 
at  any  rate  for  a  time,  and  both  the  accident  and  Mr. 
Chaplin's  departure  from  Brooksby  were  keenly  re- 
gretted. Not  many  days  later  Firr's  stud  was  weakened 
by  the  death  of  a  horse  well  known  in  Leicestershire,  an 
own  brother  to  Gamecock,  the  famous  steeplechaser. 
The  Quorn  huntsman  rode  him  for  four  seasons,  and 
found  him  one  of  the  most  brilliant  hunters  that  ever 
crossed  a  country. 

The  judges  at  the  Peterborough  Show,  held  on  the 
2nd  July  1890,  were  Captain  Carnegy,  Mr.  Chandos 
Pole,  and  Mr.  T.  Parrington,  the  last-named  having 
officiated  at  the  first  Peterborough  Show  thirteen  years 
before.  In  the  class  for  unentered  dog  hounds,  Ouorn 
Coronet,  by  Belvoir  Gambler — Charmer,  and  Sampson, 
by  Belvoir  Gordon — Shapely,  won  first  prize  from  the 
representatives  sent  on  by  the  Atherstone,  Bicester, 
Oakley,  Tynedale,  and  Warwickshire  ;  Ouorn  Dreamer, 
by  Rufford — Galliard,  was  the  prize  stallion  hound,  the 
only  thing  against  him  being  his  colour,  which  was  a 
cream  tan,  but  in  all  other  respects  he  was  well-nigh 
perfect.  It  was  in  1890  that  Mr.  B.  Paget,  whose  name 
has  been  mentioned  before,  joined  Captain  Warner  as 
colleague  in  the  mastership,  and  on  the  13th  February 
1 89 1,  what  had  so  far  been  the  run  of  the  season  took 
place,  the  fixture  being  Great  Dalby  ;  and  when  the 
hounds  wound  up  the  season  on  the  8th  April  1891, 
after  meeting  at  the  Kennels,  a  couple  of  hounds  picked 
up  a  piece  of  poisoned  meat  and  died. 

On  reading  accounts  of  the  Ouorn  and  Belvoir  runs, 

2  A 


370  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

those  who  knew  the  country  but  slightly  may  have  been 
puzzled  at  the  constant  mention  of  Holwell  Mouth  covert. 
The  explanation  is  that  for  time  out  of  mind  it  was  a 
covert  common  to  both  the  above  packs,  and,  like  most 
compromises,  this  arrangement  did  not  work  quite 
smoothly  ;  so  before  the  season  1891-92  opened,  Holwell 
Mouth  was  made  over  to  the  Belvoir,  that  hunt  giving 
up  its  claim  to  draw  a  string  of  coverts  on  a  border  line 
which  up  to  that  time  had  never  been  clearly  laid  down. 
After  this  new  arrangement,  however,  a  boundary  line 
between  the  two  hunts  was  agreed  upon,  to  the  intense 
satisfaction  of  all  concerned. 

There  is  an  old  saying,  "  The  more  splash  the  more 
sport,"  but  it  was  not  verified  at  any  rate  during  the 
first  two  months  of  the  season  1891-92.  The  ground 
was  deep  enough  in  all  conscience,  and  was  the  cause 
of  a  good  many  tumbles.  Mr.  Sidney  Paget's  horse, 
on  landing  in  a  soft  place,  fell  and  broke  its  back,  while 
a  lady  riding  in  that  gentleman's  wake  rode  over  him, 
though  luckily  without  doing  any  injury  to  the  prostrate 
sportsman.  About  the  same  time  (November  1891)  a 
sad  fatality  overtook  Mr.  Hedworth  Barclay's  stud- 
oroom,  Levi  Simpkin,  who  was  widely  known  and  re- 
spected in  Melton  Mowbray.  Together  with  a  couple 
of  stablemen,  Simpkin  was  clipping  and  singeing  a 
somewhat  fretful  hunter.  The  clipping  process  had 
been  completed,  and  soon  after  the  lamp  was  brought 
into  use,  the  horse  reared,  knocked  down  the  stud- 
oroorn,  who  subsequently  succumbed  to  the  injuries  in- 
flicted by  the  horse  trampling  on  him.  Nor  did  the 
mischief  stop  here,  for,  on  rearing  a  second  time,  he 
knocked  down  one  of  the  helpers  and  broke  his  arm. 

A  frost  in  January  1892  suggested  to  some  Leicester- 
shire sportsmen  that  time  might  be  killed  more  or  less 
effectively  by  having  a  man-hunt  with  bloodhounds  ;  so, 
a  youth   having   been    induced   to   enact   the   part  of  a 


CAPTAIN    WARNER  371 

fugitive,  two  bloodhounds  were  put  on  his  line  half-an- 
hour  later.  They  somehow  or  other  hit  on  the  trail  of 
an  unsuspecting  traveller  along  the  highroad  ;  him  they 
greatly  frightened,  and  were  with  some  difficulty  stopped. 
Eventually  they  were  put  on  the  track  of  the  original 
fugitive,  and  went  away  at  a  great  pace,  throwing  their 
tongues  to  an  extent  which  almost  rivalled  in  volume  the 
music  of  the  whole  of  the  Quorn  pack.  In  spite  of  the 
hard  ground  and  snowdrifts,  the  owner  of  the  bloodhounds 
took  the  fences  as  they  came.  In  due  course  they  drew 
up  with  their  quarry,  and  then  the  peaceable  character 
of  the  bloodhound  was  shown  by  the  fact  of  their  jump- 
ing up  at  the  fugitive  and  trying  to  lick  his  face. 

The  question  of  unnecessary  damage  had  cropped 
up  in  various  countries,  and  of  course  in  the  Ouorn  dis- 
trict, so  a  circular  was  issued  by  the  masters,  asking  their 
followers  to  abstain  from  doing  anything  which  might 
irritate  the  farmer  "  in  this  unusually  wet  season,"  and 
putting  forth  a  few  suggestions  for  their  guidance,  among 
them  being,  that  when  hounds  were  not  running  the 
field  should  keep  as  much  as  possible  to  the  roads  and 
headlands,  instead  of  galloping  over  the  grass  ;  that  they 
should  not  ride  over  seeds  or  sown  land  ;  and  that  they 
should  keep  quiet,  and  not  follow  the  huntsman  when 
casting  the  hounds.  These  hints,  though  attended  to 
by  a  certain  number,  were  disregarded  by  many,  as  most 
hunting  directions  are. 

In  a  season  which  had  been  very  middling  up  to 
that  point,  the  best  day  the  Ouorn  experienced  was  on 
Saturday  the  30th  of  January,  when  the  hounds  ran 
hard  for  about  three-quarters  of  an  hour  from  Bunny 
Old  Wood,  and  finally  pulled  down  their  fox  near  Mr. 
Martin's  new  farmhouse,  the  distance  being  reckoned 
at  seven  miles  as  hounds  ran,  and  five  from  point  to 
point.  The  worst  fall  a  man  can  get  is  when  a  horse 
puts  his  foot  in  a  rabbit-hole,  and  this  was  the  hunts- 


372  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

man's  lot  early  in  February  1892  ;  the  horse  trod  upon 
him,  but  Firr  stru^led  to  his  feet  and  finished  the 
run  somehow,  though  on  the  morrow,  Earp,1  the  first 
whipper-in,  had  to  take  his  place.  Leicestershire  also 
had  to  mourn  the  loss  of  a  good  sportsman  through  an 
accident,  which  was  unhappily  attended  with  fatal  results, 
befalling  Mr.  George  Harvey,  of  the  Curate's  Gorse  Farm. 
He  was  thrown  from  his  dog-cart,  lockjaw  eventually  set 
in,  and  this  worthy  upholder  of  hunting  succumbed  at  the 
early  age  of  forty-one,  on  Sunday  the  8th  January  1893. 
Mr.  Harvey  was  a  capital  horseman,  and  would  have 
scored  an  easy  win  in  the  point-to-point  race  in  the 
previous  spring  had  not  his  horse  fallen  at  the  last 
fence  ;  but  he  had  his  revenge  at  the  following  Melton 
Hunt  Steeplechases,  when  he  was  on  the  same  horse. 

Count  Metternich,  too,  was  among  those  who  fell 
victims  to  accidents,  he  sustaining  so  bad  a  fall  that 
it  was  some  time  before  he  could  be  removed  from  the 
Bell  Hotel,  Melton  Mowbray,  to  Belvoir  Castle,  while 
Mrs.  A.  Brocklehurst  was  much  shaken  through  her 
horse  putting  its  foot  in  a  rabbit-hole  and  falling  heavily. 
Then,  on  the  26th  June  1893,  Captain  Henry  Mont- 
gomery Campbell  died  at  his  place,  Thurmaston  Hall, 
Leicester,  after  a  short  illness.  The  Captain,  who  was 
formerly  in  the  Royal  Artillery,  had  hunted  with  the 
Quorn  for  many  years,  was  a  keen  supporter  of  the 
Hunt,  saw  a  good  deal  of  fun,  and  turned  up  at  the  end 
of  most  long  runs,  though  the  inmates  of  his  stable 
were  scarcely  up  to  Leicestershire  form.  He  seldom 
missed  the  more  important  race  meetings,  and  went 
simply  for  the  love  of  the  thing,  for  he  never  betted 
even  in  small  sums. 

To  go  back  a  few  months,  the  Quorn  men  heard 
with  unfeigned  regret  of  the  determination  of  Captain 

1  He  left  the  Quorn,  after  seventeen  years'  service,  at  the  end  of  the  season 
1897-98,  and  went  to  Mr.  Fernie. 


CAPTAIN    WARNER  373 

Warner  and  Mr.  Paget  to  resign  the  country  at  the 
end  of  the  season  1892-93.  Captain  Warner  had  shown 
himself  in  all  respects  an  excellent  master ;  he  did  the 
best  he  could  for  everybody,  kept  up  the  best  tradi- 
tions of  the  Hunt,  and  found  a  valuable  coadjutor  in 
Mr.  Paget.  After  Captain  Warner's  seven  years'  service 
to  the  Ouorn,  it  was  only  in  the  fitness  of  things  that 
the  question  of  presenting  him  with  a  testimonial  should 
be  mooted.  The  suggestion  was  adopted,  and  when 
the  hounds  met  at  Lowesby  Hall  on  the  1st  March 
1894,  the  opportunity  was  taken  to  present  the  ex- 
master  with  an  English  silver  punch-bowl  of  the  year 
1725,  and  which  weighed  108  ounces.  The  presenta- 
tion was  made  by  Sir  Frederick  Fowke,  and  amongst 
those  present  were  Lord  Lonsdale  (who  had  succeeded 
to  the  mastership),  the  Duchess  of  Marlborough,  the 
Countess  of  Wilton,  Lady  Gerard,  Lady  Carlyon,  Lord 
Essex,  Colonel  Forester,  Lord  Henry  Bentinck,  Lord 
Manners,  &c. 

About  four  months  later,  that  is  to  say,  in  July 
1894,  Captain  Warner  appeared  as  defendant  at  the 
Nottingham  Assizes  in  an  action  brought  against  him, 
the  huntsman,  and  Mr.  Marshall,  a  member  of  the 
Hunt,  by  Mr.  Willoughby,  a  farmer,  who,  until  shortly 
before  the  action,  had  occupied  land  at  Great  Dalby. 
The  alleged  damage  was  loss  of  cattle  caused  by  cows 
in  calf  picking  their  calves  owing  to  their  being  driven 
by  the  hounds,  also  for  breaking  a  gate  and  lock.  The 
sum  claimed  for  damage  was  altogether  set  down  at 
^500,  a  preposterous  amount,  which  was  very  properly 
disputed.  After  Mr.  Justice  Wills  had  summed  up, 
the  jury  gave  a  verdict  for  five  shillings  against  Mr. 
Marshall,  and  ^51  against  Captain  Warner  and  Firr. 

Some  of  the  evidence  was  rather  amusing.  The 
plaintiff  first  of  all  fixed  the  day  on  which  the  alleged 
damage   was    committed    as   the    1 6th    of   January,    but 


374 


THE    QUORN    HUNT 


Captain  Warner  produced  evidence  to  show  that  a 
frost  set  in  on  the  23rd  of  December  1892,  and  lasted 
until  the  23rd  January  1893,  during  which  period 
hounds  were  in  kennel.  The  story  as  told  by  the 
plaintiff  and  his  witnesses  was  that,  when  the  hounds 
entered  the  field  they  ran  after  the  cows,  and,  jumping 
up,  snapped  at  their  heads  and  drove  them  before  them, 
causing  them  to  pick  their  calves.  Captain  Warner, 
however,  admitted  that  the  hounds  did  cross  the  field 
in  question  about  the  23rd  of  January,  but  he  saw  no 
cows.  Tom  Firr  gave  evidence  to  the  same  effect,  and 
was  sure  that  no  cows  went  in  front  of  hounds ;  he 
never  heard  of  any  hounds  jumping  up  at  cattle,  and, 
with  pardonable  pride  in  the  behaviour  of  his  own 
pack,  expressed  a  hope  that  no  hounds  of  which  he 
had  charge  would  ever  be  guilty  of  such  unfoxhound- 
like  conduct. 

Captain  Warner  was  as  good  as  his  word,  and  retired 
at  the  end  of  the  season  1892-93.  The  horses  were  sold 
at  the  Leicester  Repository  on  the  13th  May  1893,  by 
Messrs.  Warner,  Sheppard,  and  Wade,  twenty-five 
hunters  selling  for  1944  guineas,  the  highest  price  being 
270  guineas. 


gPPfea»2ri!>». — - ^. 


EARL    OF    LONSDALE  375 


THE    EARL    OF    LONSDALE 

THE  next  master  of  the  Quorn  was  the  Earl  of 
Lonsdale,  to  whom  the  farmers  presented  a  peti- 
tion begging  him  to  take  the  country  in  the  interests  of 
fox-hunting.  Lord  Lonsdale  became  master,  and  at  the 
Puppy  Show  held  in  September  1893  spoke  pretty  plainly 
about  the  finance  department  of  hunting.  Scarcely  had 
the  season  1893-94  opened  before  the  master  issued  a 
circular-letter  on  the  subject  of  second  horsemen.  He 
requested  those  who  had  second  horses  out  to  give 
orders  to  their  servants  to  ride  with  his  own  second 
horseman,  to  jump  no  fences,  and  that  the  last  through 
a  gate  should  shut  and  hasp  it.  It  was  his  further  wish 
that  second  horsemen  should  confine  themselves  entirely 
to  roads,  lanes,  and  bye-paths  over  which  there  was  a 
right-of-way.  The  opening  fixture  of  the  season,  by  the 
way,  was  Kirby  Gate,  whence  the  first  draw  has  for  a 
long  time  been  Gartree  Hill,  whither  a  goodly  number  of 
people  thoughtlessly  made  their  way,  oblivious  of  the 
fact  that  there  had  recently  been  a  death  in  the  family 
of  the  owner  of  the  covert.  Lord  Lonsdale  therefore 
drew  Welby  Osier  Beds  first,  hut  only  moderate  sport 
followed. 

Lord  Lonsdale  apparently  intended  to  show  the 
farmers  of  the  hunt  that  they  were  not  forgotten,  and  he 
at  the  same  time  reminded  his  followers  that  they  were 
in  duty  bound  to  buy  their  forage,  &c,  from  the  farmers 
over  whose  land  they  rode.  In  his  endeavour  to  bring 
producer  and  consumer  together  the  new  master  caused 


376  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

to  be  compiled  a  document  extending  to  fourteen  pages. 
The  ruler  had  gone  in  a  business-like  way  over  the 
sheets,  and  while  the  first  column  contained  the  names 
and  addresses  of  the  farmers  who  had  forage  for  sale,  the 
second  described  the  provender,  &c,  the  third  stated  the 
quantity  to  be  disposed  of,  and  the  fourth  was  reserved 
for  remarks  as  to  quality,  &C.1  The  list  was  to  be  revised 
frequently.  Then,  before  the  shootingv  season  closed, 
Lord  Lonsdale  placed  with  Mr.  Warner,  of  Leicester,  a 
huo-e  orame  order.  The  tenant  farmers,  to  the  number 
of  about  1 200,  each  received  a  brace  of  pheasants  and  a 
hare;  while  in  October  1894  venison  was  presented  to 
the  puppy  walkers. 

In  previous  pages  it  has  been  noted  how  well-known 
followers  of  the  Quorn  had  dropped  out  of  the  running 
and  joined  the  great  majority,  and  January  1894  saw  the 
death  of  one  who  aforetime  had  been  one  of  its  best 
known  visitors — Sir  Henry  Dalrymple  des  Voeux,  who 
died  in  London  at  the  age  of  seventy-two.  For  many 
seasons  in  succession  had  Sir  Henry  taken  up  his  winter 
abode  at  Melton,  where  he  was  not  long  in  gaining 
universal  respect.  He  was  a  keen  follower  of  the 
hounds,  and  rode  to  them  fearlessly  in  his  younger  days. 
In  1863  he  married  the  youngest  daughter  of  the  Earl 
of  Wilton. 

During  March  1894  Lord  Lonsdale  invited  Mr. 
Austin  Mackenzie,  master  of  the  Woodland  Pytchley, 
to  meet  at  Keyham,  and  have  a  day  in  the  Quorn 
country.  The  hounds  were  sent  by  train  to  Ingarsby, 
and  were  met  by  a  large  field.  A  fox  was  found  at 
Scraptoft,  and  he  ran  by  Humberstone  to  Thurmaston, 
near  to  which  place  he  contrived  to  crawl  into  a  faggot 

1  In  January  1889  Mr.  Robert  Lockwood,  then  Secretary  to  the  Essex 
Hunt,  invited  farmers  in  the  county  who  had  either  forage  or  horses  for  sale 
to  send  him  a  description,  which  he  would  register.  He  also  invited  hunting 
men  to  communicate  with  him,  and  in  that  way  he  hoped  to  bring  buyer  and 
seller  together  for  their  mutual  benefit. 


EARL    OF    LONSDALE  377 

heap;  whence,  on  being  dislodged,  he  made  his  way  back 
to  Scraptoft.  From  there  he  was  hunted  at  a  good  pace 
over  the  valley  to  Hungarton  and  on  by  Ouenby  past 
Lowesby  Hall  to  the  railway,  where  scent  failed. 

Mention  of  Lowesby  Hall  reminds  one  that  the  late 
Mr.  Bromley  Davenport  wrote  a  poem  bearing  that 
name,  on  the  lines  of  Lord  Tennyson's  "Locksley  Hall," 
of  which  the  jpllowing  is  a  copy.  It  is  believed  that 
"  Lowesby  Hall"  first  appeared  in  1866  in  a  book  called 
"  Lays  of  the  Belvoir  Hunt,"  a  work  of  which  a  few 
copies  only  were  printed,  and  which  is  now  seldom  if  ever 
met  with. 


LOWESBY    HALL. 

BY    W.    BROMLEY-DAVENPORT. 

Gilmour,  leave  me  here  a  little,  until  John  o'  Gaunt  be  drawn, 
And  if  you  find  the  raw  material,  let  Jack  Morgan  blow  his  horn ; 

'Tis  the  place,  and  all  about  it,  as  of  old  the  magpies  call, 
Drawing  curses  from  The  Lad,  and  flying  over  Lowesby  Hall. 

Lowesby  Hall,  that  in  the  distance  overlooks  those  grassy  plains, 
Swamped  from  Twyford  to  the  Coplow  by  the  everlasting  rains. 

Many  a  morn  from  yonder  spinney,  in  November  drear  and  chill, 
Have  I  seen  the  wily  creature  slowly  creeping  up  the  hill. 

And  at  eve  I've  watched  the  vapour  of  my  last  remaining  weed, 
When  my  spurs  had  ceased  to  animate  my  apathetic  Steed. 

How  in  search  of  sport  I've  wandered,  nourishing  a  verdant  youth 
With  the  fairy  tales  of  Gallops,  ancient  runs  devoid  of  truth. 

When  I  looked  into  my  prospects  far  as  ever  I  could  get, 
And  felt  the  wild,  delirious  joy  of  getting  deeply  into  debt. 

In  the  Spring  the  pink  no  longer  clothes  the  sad  Meltonian's  breast, 
In  the  Spring  the  stump't-up  horses  are  allowed  a  little  rest. 

In  the  Spring,  too,  he  must  settle  for  the  cursed  corn  and  hay, 
In  the  Spring  the  dire  conviction  comes  upon  him     he  must  pay. 


378  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

Then  my  tradesmen  all  around  my  door  most  obstinately  clung ; 
And  their  eyes  on  all  my  motions  with  a  mute  observance  hung. 

So  I  said,  "  My  faithful  tailor,  do  a  bit  of  stiff  for  me ; 

Trust  me  yet ;  my  Uncle's  shaky,  all  his  coin  shall  flow  to  thee." 

O'er  his  greasy  cheek  and  forehead  rushed  a  colour  and  a  light, 
As  I've  seen  the  quick  lamplighter  turning  on  the  gas  at  night. 

And  he  said,  "  I'm  proud  to  serve  thee,  Sir,  as  any  gent  in  town ; 
If  so  shaky  be  thine  Uncle  thou  shalt  have  the  money  down." 

Credit  seized  the  glass  of  time,  and  dribbled  out  the  golden  sand  ; 
.Every  day  became  more  valueless  my  frequent  notes  of  hand. 

Many  a  morning  have  I  waited,  with  my  hopes  upon  the  rack, 
For  the  long-expected  postman  with  the  letter  edged  with  black. 

Health  revived  my  hardy  Uncle,  now,  alas  !  he  coughs  no  more, 
And  the  day  of  his  decease  seems  more  distant  than  before. 

Oh,  my  tailor  shallow-hearted  ;  oh,  my  tailor — mine  no  more ; 

Oh,  the  dreary,  dreary  Bond  Street ;  oh,  that  Strand's  unhappy  shore  ! 

I  could  practise,  oh  !  how  gladly,  in  the  fulness  of  my  hate, 
All  the  Slasher's  last  instructions  on  thine  ugly  dial  plate. 

Is  it  well  to  use  me  thus,  Sir,  having  known  me,  to  decline 
Any  further  cash  advances  with  security  like  mine  ? 

But  it  may  be  !  thou  shalt  lower,  to  the  level  of  a  dun, 
Seeking  custom  with  acrostics,  like  the  Moseses  and  Son. 

As  the  tradesmen,  so  the  customer,  and  thou  shalt  measure  clowns ; 
They  shall  pay  thee  for  thy  corduroys  in  ignominious  browns. 

I  would  use  thee,  if  my  passion  might  expend  its  real  force, 
Little  better  than  my  dog,  and  something  worser  than  my  horse. 

What  is  that  which  I  can  turn  to?    Can  a  gentleman  descend 
To  dig  the  very  gold  which  nature  had  intended  him  to  spend  ? 

I  had  been  content  to  perish  on  the  sandy  Sussex  shore, 
Where  Militia-men  are  marshall'd  and  Minie  rifles  roar. 

But  the  gentle  voice  of  Cobden  drowns  the  fierce  invader's  drum ; 
And  Napoleon  does  but  bluster,  and  Frenchmen  funk  to  come. 

Could  I  but  relieve  in  fancy  ?     But  recall  the  past  again  ? 

Canst  thou  ease  my  wild  emotions,  oh  thou  wonderful  champagne  ? 

Give  me  back  the  quick  pulsations  I  have  often  felt  before, 
When  my  horse  was  on  before  me,  and  my  hack  was  at  the  door. 


EARL    OF    LONSDALE  379 

Yearning  for  the  large  excitement  that  the  coming  sport  would  yield, 
And  rejoicing  at  the  cropper  that  I  got  the  second  field. 

And  at  night  along  the  highway,  in  November  dark-and  chill, 
Saw  the  fcghts  of  Melton  shining  from  the  top  of  Burton  Hill. 

Then  my  spirit  rushed  before  me,  and  I  felt  the  "thirty-four" 
Percolating  through  my  system — noble  vintage  !  now  no  more. 

Brother  sportsmen  and  protectionists  rejecting  all  things  new, 
Oh,  the  future  that's  impending  is  a  queerish  one  for  you ; 

For  I've  dipped  into  that  future,  reading  out  the  book  of  fate, 
And  saw  Fox  Hunting  there  abolished  by  an  order  of  the  State. 

Saw  the  heavens  filled  with  guano,  raining  forth  at  man's  command, 
Showers  of  unsavoury  mixture  for  the  benefit  of  land. 

Saw  the  airy  Navies  earthward  bear  the  planetary  swell, 
Saw  the  long-projected  railway  made  from  Hanover  to  H — 1. 

Saw  the  landlords  yield  their  acres,  after  centuries  of  wrongs, 
To  the  cotton  Lords,  to  whom,  it's  proved,  all  property  belongs. 

Queen,  Religion,  State  abandoned,  and  all  flags  of  party  furl'd, 
In  the  Government  of  Cobden  and  the  dotage  of  the  world. 

Then  shall  outraged  common  sense  espouse  some  other  planet's  cause, 
Then  shall  rogues  abound  in  England,  bonneting  the  slumbering  laws. 

Here  at  least  I'll  stay  no  longer ;  let  me  seek  for  some  abode, 
Deep  in  some  provincial  country  far  from  rail  and  turnpike  road ; 

There  to  break  all  links  of  habit,  and  to  find  a  secret  charm 
In  the  mysteries  of  manuring  and  the  produce  of  a  farm. 

There  deplore  the  fall  of  barley,  there  discuss  the  rise  in  peas, 
Over  flagons  of  October,  giant  mounds  of  bread  and  cheese  ; 

Never  company  to  dinner,  never  visitors  from  town, 

Except  the  Parson  and  the  Doctor  (Mr.  Smith  and  Mr.  Brown). 

Droops  the  heavy  conversation  to  an  after-dinner  snort, 
And  articulation  dwindles  with  the  second  flask  of  port. 

Here  methinks  would  be  enjoyment  more  than  at  the  festive  board, 
At  the  hunger-mocking,  kickshaw-covered  table  of  a  Lord. 

There  my  heart  shall  beat  no  longer  with  my  passion's  foolish  throbs — 
I  will  wed  some  vulgar  woman,  she  shall  rear  my  race  of  snobs  ; 

Double-jointed,  mutton-fisted,  they  shall  run,  for  they  shan't  ride, 
Hunting  with  the  York  and  Ainsty,  or  the  Harriers  of  Brookside. 


380  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

Fool,  again  the  dream,  the  fancy  !  but  I  know  my  words  are  stuff, 
I  who  hold  the  swell  provincial  lower  than  the  Melton  Muff. 

I  to  hunt  with  fustian  jackets  !  my  remaining  years  to  pass — 
With  the  refuse  of  Protection,  in  a  land  devoid  of  grass.  ^ 

Tied  to  one  perpetual  woman,  what  to  me  were  soil  or  clime? 
I  who  never  could  endure  the  same  for  ten  days  at  a  time. 

I  who  held  it  better  to  pursue  the  patriarchal  plan 
Than  tamely  to  submit  to  a  monopoly  of  man  ? 

Hark  !  my  merry  comrades  call  me,  and  Jack  Morgan  blows  his  horn, 
I  to  whom  their  foolish  pastime  is  an  object  of  my  scorn. 

Can  a  sight  be  more  disgusting,  more  absurd  a  paradox, 
Than  two  hundred  people  riding  madly  at  one  fox  ? 

Will  his  capture  on  the  morrow  any  satisfaction  bring  ? 

I  am  sham'd  thro'  all  my  nature  to  have  done  so  flat  a  thing. 

Weakness,  to  be  wroth  with  weakness,  I'm  an  idiot  for  my  pains ; 
Nature  made  for  every  sportsman  an  inferior  set  of  brains. 

Not  in  vain  the  distance  beckons — what's  that  skirting  the  hill  side  ? 
Tis  THE  FOX  !  I'll  bet  a  hundred— forward  !  forward!  let  me  ride. 

I'm  before  them  and  they  curse  me,  but  no  matter,  go  along; 
Better  fifty  yards  before  the  hounds  than  ten  behind  the  throng. 

Oh,  I  hear  you  !  you  may  holloa  !  but  my  spirit  knows  no  bounds ; 
Curse  the  scent  and  blast  the  master,  rot  the  huntsman,  d — n  the 
hounds. 

Ha  !  ha  !  ha  !  was  that  an  oxer?     What  ?  old  Rambler?  is  he  dead  ? 
Never  mind  !     Pick  up  the  pieces  ;  he  was  mortal ;  go  ahead  ! 

They've  lost  him,  and  I  did  it !     Oh,  of  course,  I  always  do  ! 
Here's  Sir  Richard — black  as  thunder  ;  I'll  evaporate,  adieu  ! 

Plough  the  grass  ;  erect  wire  fences  ;  shoot  the  foxes ;  freeze  and  snow  ; 
Yes,  I  can  catch  the  train  at  Leicester  :  so  to  Euston  Square  I  go. 


When  hounds  meet  in  towns  the  occasion  is  always 
popular,  and  though  the  kennel  address  is  "  Quorn, 
Louo-hboroueh,"  the  inhabitants  of  the  town  see  as 
a  rule  little  or  nothing  of  hounds.  Councillor  Mayo, 
however,  came  to  the  conclusion  that  it  would  not  be 
a  bad  idea  if  Lord  Lonsdale  could  be  induced  to  meet 


EARL    OF    LONSDALE  381 

one  day  in  the  Market  Place,  Loughborough,  and  the 
master  consented  to  do  so,  fixing  Tuesday  the  26th 
March  1894  for  the  gathering,  the  hour  being  noon. 
The  weather  was  most  propitious,  and  long  before  the 
appointed  hour  the  square  began  to  fill,  while  the  fore- 
noon trains  landed  a  large  contingent  :  it  was  estimated 
that  about  ten  thousand  people  were  present.  From 
the  town  hall  to  the  other  side  of  the  street  an  arch- 
way had  been  erected,  on  which  was  to  be  seen  the 
legend,  "  Success  to  Fox-hunting."  Lord  Lonsdale, 
Lady  Gerard,  Mr.  Atherley,  and  Mr.  Barclay  drove  up 
in  an  open  carriage,  and  came  in  for  much  cheering,  as 
also  did  the  huntsman  and  whippers-in  on  arriving  with 
the  pack.  The  Mayor's  parlour  was  the  scene  of  much 
hospitality,  and  when  the  hounds  moved  off  for  the 
first  draw  they  were  followed,  as  a  spectator  remarked, 
by  a  curious  collection  of  "mounts  and  machines."  The 
meeting  was  a  great  success,  and  perhaps  nothing  more 
enthusiastic  had  been  witnessed  since  Mr.  Baker,  then 
master  of  the  North  Warwickshire,  met  for  the  edifi- 
cation of  the  distressed  weavers  at  Coventry  railway 
station  on  the  25th  February  1861,  on  which  occasion 
a  military  officer  estimated  the  attendance  at  between 
thirty  and  forty  thousand  people. 

On  an  earlier  page  mention  was  made  of  the  Melton 
Hunt  balls,  but  those  entertainments  appear  to  have 
dropped  out  of  fashion  until  they  were  revived  in  Feb- 
ruary 1895.  F'or  the  preceding  decade  the  members 
of  the  Hunt  had  joined  with  the  townspeople  in  attend- 
ing what  had  been  known  as  the  Primrose  League  ball, 
but  it  lost  its  attraction,  so  it  was  determined  to  drop  it 
and  revive  the  Melton  Hunt  ball,  which  took  place  in 
the  Corn  Exchange  and  proved  a  great  success,  many 
of  those  who  had  been  driven  from  Leicestershire  by 
frost  making  a  special  pilgrimage  back  again  in  order  to 
be  present.      In  the  summer  of  1895  there  were  on  view 


382  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

eight  pictures  of  the  Ouorn  Hunt  painted  by  Mr.  G.  D. 
Giles,  which  were  very  generally  approved  of ;  but  as 
they  are  of  tolerably  recent  execution,  and  as  most 
Leicestershire  men  have  seen  them,  it  is  unnecessary 
here  to  review  them  again. 

It  was  in  1891,  during  the  mastership  of  Captain 
Warner  and  Mr.  Paget,  that  Lord  Lonsdale  covered 
twenty  miles  in  56  minutes  55*-  seconds,  including  the 
time  in  changing,  a  feat  which  would  have  immensely 
delighted  Squire  Osbaldeston.  The  story  runs  that 
while  Lord  Lonsdale  was  staying  at  Ingestre  with 
Lord  Shrewsbury  conversation  turned  upon  driving  and 
speed.  Lord  Lonsdale  ventured  to  remark,  or  is  said  to 
have  done  so,  that  first-class  trotters  would  always  beat 
gallopers.  Eventually  a  match  was  made  for  ^iooa 
side  to  cover  twenty  miles  in  four  styles  of  driving, 
either  competitor  to  trot  or  gallop  as  he  pleased.  Lord 
Shrewsbury  eventually  paid  forfeit  ;  but  Lord  Lonsdale, 
determined  to  show  what  could  be  done,  went  through 
the  programme.  He  first  started  with  a  single  horse  in 
a  buggy  and  drove  the  five  miles  in  13  minutes  39J 
seconds  ;  the  return  journey  was  accomplished  with  a 
pair  of  horses  in  12  minutes  5 if  seconds.  A  coach  and 
four  was  driven  for  the  third  five  miles,  which  occupied  ' 
1 5  minutes  9!  seconds,  and  for  the  final  five  miles  Lord 
Lonsdale  drove  postillion  fashion,  the  journey  taking  13 
minutes  55^  seconds.  There  were  two  short  delays — 
one  caused  by  a  waggon,  the  other  by  the  police.  The 
performance  took  place  on  the  nth  March  1891,  not  far 
from  Reigate. 

On  Monday  the  28th  of  March  1898,  Mr.  J.  D. 
Cradock,  who  for  more  than  a  dozen  years  had  been 
secretary  to  the  Quorn  Hunt,  was  presented  with  a 
richly  deserved  testimonial,  consisting  of  a  silver  cup 
and  a  cheque.  As  Lord  Belper  mentioned,  in  making 
the  presentation,  his  father  and  grandfather  before  him 


EARL    OF    LONSDALE  383 

had  befriended  the  Quorn  ;  so  a  short  notice  of  the 
family's  connection  with  the  Quorn  Hunt  may  not  prove 
uninteresting. 

For  how  long  the  Cradocks  had  been  settled  in  Leicester- 
shire we  do  not  know,  but  at  any  rate  a  Mr.  John  Cradock 
was  one  of  the  most  prominent  leaders  and  supporters  of  the 
Quorn  Hunt  from  the  time  of  Mr.  Meynell  down  to  that  of  Sir 
Harry  Goodricke  ;  and  in  consideration  of  the  valuable  honorary 
services  he  rendered  to  the  Quorn,  a  handsome  piece  of  plate 
was  presented  to  him  by  the  members  of  the  Hunt.  He  was 
about  the  oldest  fox-hunter  in  Leicestershire  at  the  time  of  his 
death,  which  event  took  place  in  1833,  Sir  Harry  Goodricke,  Lord 
Plymouth,  and  Mr.  Cradock  all  dying  at  about  the  same  time, 
so  that  within  a  very  few  weeks  Leicestershire  had  to  mourn 
the  loss  of  three  of  her  best  known  sportsmen.  Mr.  Cradock 
had  the  management  of  the  coverts  in  Lord  Foley's  time  (1802), 
while  during  the  reign  of  succeeding  masters  he  was  "  the  Metter- 
nich  of  the  hunt  "  ;  he  was  an  out  and  out  sportsman,  and  did 
more  than  all  others  put  together  to  conciliate  the  farmers,  and, 
when  he  departed  this  life,  no  man  was  more  sincerely  mourned. 

Mr.  Cradock's  son  John  was  born  about  1792,  and  was,  if 
anything,  even  a  more  enthusiastic  fox-hunter  than  his  father 
had  been.  He  went  to  school  first  at  Ashbourne,  and  then  to 
Rugby ;  he  afterwards  became  a  solicitor,  and  in  partnership 
with  his  brother,  Mr.  Thomas  Cradock,  maintained  the  reputa- 
tion which  had  long  attached  to  the  firm.  Year  in,  year  out, 
every  day  that  he  could  spare  from  professional  duties — it  has 
been  whispered  that  he  induced  his  brother  to  do  a  fair  share 
of  his  work  — was  spent  either  in  hunting  or  furthering  the 
cause  of  the  sport.  From  November  to  April  he  was  in  the 
field  as  often  as  possible,  and  from  April  to  November  scarcely 
a  day  passed  on  which  some  scheme  for  the  benefit  of  the 
Hunt  did  not  receive  his  serious  attention.  He  was,  too,  a 
capital  judge  of  a  horse,  and  no  one  ever  saw  him  badly 
mounted.  When  Mr.  Errington  (master  from  1835  to  1838)  was 
absent  Mr.  John  Cradock  invariably  acted  as  field  master,  and 
on  one  occasion,  after  a  fox  had  been  found  near  Six  Hills, 
a  gentleman,  mounted  on  a  headstrong  grey  horse,  was  seen 
riding  on  the  very  backs  of  the  hounds,  a  fog  prevailing  at  the 
time.  Mr.  Cradock  on  that  occasion  dispensed  with  his  usual 
easy    and     persuasive    manner,    and    rated    the    offender    in    no 


384  THE    QUORN    HUNT 

measured  speech.  "  I  could  not  hold  my  stupid  horse,"  was 
the  offender's  explanation.  "Those  that  can't  should  stay  at 
home,"  retorted  Mr.  Cradock.  "Let  me  know  the  days  on 
which  you  are  master,  and  I  will,"  replied  the  transgressor ; 
but  ere  the  sun  had  set  Mr.  Cradock  went  up  to  the  rider  of 
the  grey  and  begged  that  his  "  transient  ebullition  might  be 
earthed,  for  it  was  earthy."  Mr.  John  Cradock  married  a 
daughter  of  Mr.  Robert  Piper,  of  Yorkshire,  and  died  in  1838 
from  influenza — so  the  fiend  was  about  even  then. 

The  next  of  the  family  to  become  prominently  connected 
with  the  Quorn  was  Mr.  Thomas  Cradock,  presumably  his 
brother,  as  Mr.  John  Cradock  left  no  issue.  He  appears  to 
have  been  secretary  during  the  mastership  of  Sir  Richard 
Sutton,  for  he  defended  the  baronet  when  he  was  sued  for 
trespass  in  the  county  court  by  a  tenant  farmer  for  damage 
committed  by  riding  over  his  land.  Mr.  Thomas  Cradock, 
"  the  assessor  of  damages  " — for  he  it  was  who  held  the  balance 
at  the  season's  end,  and  listened  to  the  wail  of  the  complaining 
farmer  —  while  denying  that  any  damage  had  been  committed, 
offered  the  farmer  a  reasonable  sum,  but  the  offer  was  refused, 
the  farmer  hoping  to  "  strangle  fox-hunting  altogether."  Into 
the  box  went  the  plaintiff,  and  swore  to  a  man  wearing  a  velvet 
cap  riding  over  his  land.  Mr.  Cradock  thereupon  proved  that 
many  followers  of  the  Quorn  wore  black  velvet  caps — "  dashers  " 
they  were  called  in  the  time  of  Mr.  Meynell.  The  offender  wore 
a  red  coat,  urged  the  farmer,  and  Mr.  Cradock,  in  his  blandest 
tones,  pointed  out  that  more  than  half  of  the  followers  of  Sir 
Richard's  hounds  were  similarly  arrayed,  so  as  the  farmer 
could  not  swear  that  Sir  Richard  Sutton  was  the  trespasser, 
he  was  "  grassed  and  saddled  with  costs,"  as  the  hunting  people 
phrased  it. 

Sir  Richard  Sutton  was  master  from  1847  to  1856,  in  which 
year  he  died,  and  shortly  before  his  decease  he  decided  that 
"  some  lasting  token  of  his  appreciation  of  the  services  rendered  " 
by  Mr.  Thomas  Cradock  should  be  presented  to  him  ;  but  he  did 
not  live  to  carry  out  his  intention.  But  the  expressed  wish  of  the 
late  baronet  was  not  forgotten  by  his  family,  so  after  some  little 
delay  there  was  a  small  dinner-party  at  Quorndon  Hall,  at  which 
Mr.  Cradock,  the  members  of  Sir  Richard  Sutton's  family,  and  a 
few  friends,  were  present.  Mr.  Tidd  Pratt,  one  of  Sir  Richard 
Sutton's  executors,  was  deputed  to  offer  Mr.  Cradock  the  testi- 
monial, which  consisted  of  a  silver  candelabrum  with  six  branches, 


EARL    OF    LONSDALE  385 

with  a  flower  vase  in  the  centre.  On  the  pedestal  were  engraven 
Mr.  Cradock's  crest  and  an  inscription,  while  at  intervals  round 
the  base  were  frosted  silver  figures  —  a  fox  and  cub,  a  fox 
breaking  covert,  and  a  hound  in  hot  pursuit. 

So  far  as  I  can  understand,  the  above  appears  to  have  been 
a  private  testimonial  from  the  Sutton  family,  but  seven  years 
later,  that  is  to  say,  in  1863,  Mr.  Cradock's  good  offices  to  the 
Hunt  were  recognised  by  the  members  at  large.  On  April  10, 
1863,  about  thirty  of  the  subscribers  to  the  testimonial  dined  at 
the  King's  Head,  Loughborough,  Mr.  W.  P.  Herrick  being  in 
the  chair.  The  chairman  spoke  in  terms  of  the  highest  respect 
of  Mr.  Cradock's  father  and  brother,  and  duly  made  the  presen- 
tation. The  testimonial,  which  consisted  of  plate  of  the  value  of 
200  guineas,  comprised  a  large  silver  salver,  two  pairs  of  candle- 
sticks, and  a  pair  of  fruit  and  flower  stands,  an  inscription  stating 
that  the  testimonial  was  offered  by  members  of  the  Hunt  in 
testimony  of  their  appreciation  of  his  zealous  and  gratuitous 
services  as  secretary  and  treasurer  of  the  Hunt  for  a  period  of 
upwards  of  twenty-three  years. 

The  official  connection  of  one  family  with  a  Hunt  for  so  long 
a  time,  save  in  the  case  of  the  mastership  of  family  packs,  is,  we 
should  say,  almost  unique.  For  upwards  of  a  hundred  years — 
there  may  have  been  an  interval — has  the  Cradock  family  per- 
formed yeoman  service  to  the  Quorn  Hunt,  and  the  function 
of  1898  is  remarkable  for  the  fact  that  it  made  the  fourth  testi- 
monial presented  to  the  family,  while  had  Mr.  John  Cradock  the 
second  lived  a  little  longer  his  merits  would  certainly  have  been 
recognised  in  similar  fashion. 

In  the  autumn  of  1896  Lord  Lonsdale  threatened  to 
resign  the  country,  but  ultimately  consented  to  continue 
in  office.  In  1898,  however,  the  end  came,  and  Captain 
E.  Burns  Hartopp  was  appointed  his  successor. 


2  B 


INDEX 


INDEX 


Accident. — Barclay,  Capt.  (fatal),  36S  ; 
Barclay,  Mr.  Hedworth,  353  ;  Barker, 
Mr.,  366;  Boothroyd,  Ben,  253  ;  Bullen, 
Rev.  Mr.,  262;  Burton,  Dick,  1  i4;Cante- 
loupe,  Lord,  212  ;  Coventry,  Hon.  A., 
266;  curious  collision,  a,  360;  Daven- 
port, Mr.  Bromley,  2S7,  2S8  ;  Douglas, 
Lord  James,  344  ;  Firr,  Tom,  331,  340, 
358,  372  ;  Foley,  Lord,  82 ;  Gardner, 
Lord,  189,  213;  Graham,  Sir  Belling- 
ham,  117,  120;  Greene,  Mr.  Henry, 
208 ;  Gilmour,  Mr.  Little,  253;  Harvey, 
Mr.  George  (fatal),  372  ;  Hope,  Lady 
Ida,  324  ;  Ker,  Lord  Charles,  300 ; 
Metternich,  Count,  372  ;  Musgrave,  Sir 
James,  223 ;  Musters,  Mr.,  349 ;  Onions, 
Roger  (fatal),  303  ;  Osbaldeston,  Mr. 
George,  112;  Rossmore,  Lord  (fatal), 
333  ;  Simpkin,  Levi  (fatal),  370  ;  Smith, 
Mr.  Rowland,  240 ;  Sutton,  Sir  Richard, 
231;  Stamford,  Lord,  337;  Varnam, 
Thomas  (fatal),  89  ;  Webster,  Master 
C.  C.  H.  (fatal),  321;  Wilton,  Lord, 
232,  306,  325 

Alcibiade  wins  the  Grand  National,  Mr. 
Angell's,  290 

Alvanley,  Lord,  and  his  top-boots,  12 

Alvanley's,  Lord,  retort  on  Lord 
Foley,  12 

Anecdote. — Alvanley,  Lord,  12,  151  ; 
Alvanley  and  Foley,  Lords,  12;  Baird, 
Sir  David,  no;  Berners,  Lord,  176; 
blacksmith,  the  female,  257;  Burgess, 
Mr.,  163;  Campbell,  Capt.,  237; 
Campbell,  "Saddle,"  and  Mr.  Maxse, 
no;  Carter,  George,  88;  Charlton 
Run,  the,  77 ;  Christian,  Dick,  190 ; 
Combers,  Mr.  Charles  ("The  Flying 
Cucumber"),  64;  cruel  joke,  a,  350; 
curious  coincidence,  a,  223 ;  Duke  of 
Rutland  and  the  Quorn,  319;  Ernest 
of  Saxe-Coburg,  Prince,  191,  193 ; 
Filar,  Mr.  James,  156,  157  ;  farmer's 
wife,  a  sporting,  295  ;  Ford,  Dr.,  47  ; 


Forester,  Cecil,  48 ;  Gardner,  Lord, 
176 ;  Gardiner,  Mr.,  169 ;  Glossop, 
Mr.,  233;  Goodricke,  Mr.  Holyoake, 
160,  161  ;  Goodricke,  Sir  Harry,  145, 
147,  151  ;  groom,  an  honest,  271  ; 
Heycock,  Tom,  93 ;  Hodgson,  Mr., 
and  Lord  Gardner,  191  ;  Hodgson, 
Mr.,  and  Lord  Hastings,  18S  ;  horses, 
109,  no,  in,  152,  190,  341,  342; 
hounds,  49;  hounds,  Mr.  W.  Gardiner 
and  the  Melton,  26  ;  hunting  costume 
and  religious  principles,  333  ;  hunting 
on  wheels,  325;  huntsman,  a,  211  : 
huntsman  and  the  hard  rider,  the, 
336  ;  huntsmen  on  Mr.  Musters's  staff. 
305  ;  Johnstone's  red  coat  and  scarlet 
leggings,  Jamie,  14  ;  larking  at  Melton, 
18;  Maberley,  Mr.,  232;  Maher,  Mr. 
Val.,  109;  Maxse  and  A.  Smith,  Messrs., 
91  ;  Meltonians  —  a  play,  the,  167; 
Meynell,  Mr.  Hugo,  47,  48,  64 ;  Mor- 
gan, Ben,  225  ;  Osbaldeston,  Mr. 
George,  106,  107  :  Rancliffe,  Lord,  235  ; 
Rancliffe,  Lord,  and  Mr.  James  Ellar, 
158;  rider  jumps  into  a  tobacconist's 
shop,  345  ;  ringing  church  bells,  272  ; 
St.  Maur,  Lord  A.,  and  Walton  Thorns, 
295  ;  Sefton,  Lord,  and  Meynell,  Mr., 
64;  Smith,  Mr.  Assheton,  86,87,91,93  ; 
Sothern,  Mr.,  and  the  Quorn,  300-301  ; 
stable  fittings,  eccentric,  16;  stag- 
hunt  in  Melton,  a,  194;  stud-groom, 
a  peremptory,  17  ;  Suffield,  Lord,  17S, 
179 ;  Sutton,  Sir  Richard,  224,  225, 
237,  242;  Waterford,  Lord,  160,  165, 
168,  177,  260;  Wingfield,  Tom,  71, 
76,91 

Atherstone  absorbs  part  of  the  Quorn 
country,  the,  4 

Attempt  to  slake  hounds  and  horses,  210 

Bailiffs    take   Lord   Suffield's   hounds 

and  horses,  182 
Belgrave  Hall,  description  of,  129 


389 


39° 


INDEX 


Bells  rung  in  honour  of  Lord  Stamford's 

hounds,  272 
Bells  to  resemble  cry  of  hounds,  tuning, 

39 

Belvoir  and  Holwell  Mouth  Covert,  the, 
37o 

Belvoir  Castle,  Quorn  meet  at,  159 

Billesdon  Coplow  Run,  the,  54 

Blankney  hounds,  invited  to  hunt  in  the 
Quorn  country,  352 

Bloodhounds,  run  with,  .370 

Boodle's,  the  Masters  of  Foxhounds' 
Association,  8 

Books. — Belvoir  Hounds,  Memoirs  of 
the,  45  ;  Derbyshire  and  Yorks, 
Sketch  of  a  Tourist  into,  48  ;  Eraser's 
Magazine,  13 ;  Gent/e/iiaiis  Maga- 
zine, the,  41,  44 ;  Hunting  Songs 
and  Sport,  39,  182;  Hunting  Tours 
and  Reminiscences  (Nimrod),  85  ; 
Jones,  Tom,  42 ;  Leicester,  History 
of,  36 ;  Leicestershire,  Excursions 
into,  53 ;  Leicestershire,  History  of, 
36,  40 ;  Leicestershire,  Select  Views 
in,  48 ;  Literary  and  Miscellaneous 
Memoirs  (Cradock,  jun.),  41,  81  ; 
Meynellian  Science,  the,  46 ;  Music 
and  Friends,  25,  169 ;  Newmarket, 
History  of,  41  ;  Scott  and  Sebright,  1 1  ; 
Smith,  Life  of  Mr.  Assheton,  85 ; 
Sportascrapiana,  1 15;  Sussex  Archaeo- 
logical Collection,  79 

Boots,  top,  12 

Boundaries  of  the  Quorn  country,  the,  3 

Bowden,  Tom,  23 

Bradgate  Park,  250 

Burdett,  account  of  Sir  Francis,  212 

Characters. — Barnaby,  Rev.  A.,  252  ; 
Ellar,  Mr.  James,  156  ;  Fouldes,  Ben- 
jamin, 215;  Heseltine,  Mr.  Andrew, 
345  ;  Hinman,  Mary  Anne  (the 
"  female  blacksmith  "),  257  ;  Inchley, 
Tot,  the  horse-dealer,  118;  Lambert, 
Mr.  Daniel,  80 ;  Richards,  Mr.,  256 

Charlton  hounds,  run  with,  77 

Charnwood  Forest,  37,  38 

Christian,  Dick,  as  huntsman,  273  ;  his 
great  leap,  190  ;  life  and  death,  273, 
274 

Circulars,  371,  375 

Clashing  of  packs  of  hounds,  Belvoir  and 
Quorn,  297  ;  Mr.  Musters's and  Quorn, 

214,  323 
Club,  Lord  Rokehy's,    11  ;  the  new,  n  ; 
the  old,  1 48 


Comber,  Mr.  Chas.  ("The  Flying  Cu- 
cumber "),  64  ;  and  Harvey's  Sauce,  65 

Costume,  hunting,  14,  129 

Cottesmore,  the  Queen's  staghounds  visit 
the,  342 

Country,  alteration  of,  50,  51 

Coventry,  Mr.,  rides  Alcibiade,  winner 
of  Grand  National  (1865),  290 

Coverts,    improving,   270 ;    management 

of,  307 
Cradock,    Mr.    Thos.,    secretary    of    the 
Quorn    Hunt,    234 ;    presentation    to 
Mr.  J.   D.  Cradock,  and   account    of 
the  family,  382 

Damage,  hunting,  309 

Derby  winner,  riding  a,  79 

Dinner  to  Errington,  Mr.  R.,  163,  170; 
Goodricke,  Sir  Harry,  144  ;  Hodgson, 
Mr.,  185  ;  old  soldiers  in  Leicester, 
343  ;  Sutton,  Sir  R.,  222 

Dispute,  the  Quorn,  S 

Donington.  —  Country  absorbed  by 
the  Quorn,  6 ;  country  given  up  by 
the  Marquis  of  Hastings,  5  ;  draw 
Prestwold  Covert,  183 ;  proposed 
mutual  draw  with  the  Quorn,  188 ; 
Story,  Mr.  G.  B.,  as  master,  5 

Drag-hunt  in  Leicester,  a,  36 

Drury  Lane  Theatre,  "The  Meltonians," 
167 

Earth-stopper,  Arnold,  158;  claims, 
121  ;  dinner  and  payments,  329;  pre- 
sentation to  Mr.  Musters  by,  308 ;  to 
Mr.  Coupland,  330 

Egerton  Lodge,  15 

Expenditure,  hunting,  125 

Extravagance  of  the  Quorndon  Hunt, 
alleged,  48 

Farmers  and  fox-hunting,  361 
Ferneley's  pictures,  Mr.,  254 
Fixtures,  non-advertisement  of,  346 
Floods,  237 
Fox's  adventures,  a,  332  ;  poisoned,  239  ; 

run  by  pack  alone,  326  ;  Russian,  160  ; 

Sir  R.  Sutton  accused  of  buying,  231 
Fracas  in  the  hunting-field,  a,  224 
Frewen,  Mr.,  the  representation  of  North 

Leicestershire  in  Parliament,  304 

Gardiner's  experiences  in  the  hunting- 
field,  Mr.,  169 

Gardner  (Lord),  alleged  unpopularity  of, 
191 


INDEX 


391 


Gorse,     Sir     Harry     Goodricke's,     26S  ; 

Prince  of  Wales's,  320,  351 
Grand  National  Hunt  Steeplechase,  the 

first,  2S8,  289 

Harborough,  country  taken  by  Mr. 
Richard  Sutton,  238 

Harborough,  Lord,  sets  dog  -  spears  in 
Stapleford  Park,  190  ;  Harborough, 
Lady,  throws  open  Stapleford  Park 
to  the  hounds,  262 

Hard  riding,  48 

Heycock,  Tom,  his  riding,  93 

Heygate,  Mr.,  offers  to  issue  circulars,  292 

"  Hichens,"  Sir  B.,  hoax  concerning  this 
fabled  person,  288 

Hoax,  supposed  fatal  accident  to  "  Sir 
B.  Hichens,"  2S8 

Holwell  Mouth  Covert  question,  the, 
37o 

Horn,  Squire  Boothby's  hunting,  38 

Horses. — Anecdotes  of,  109,  no,  in, 
152,  190,  341,  342  ;  attempt  to  stake, 
210;  breeding,  179;  dealer,  acelebrated, 
118;  disease,  196;  "Doctor,  the," 
344;  dyeing,  341  ;  first  introduction 
of  second,  77  '■>  "Game  Chicken," 
winner  of  first  G.N.H.  Steeplechase, 
289;  height  of,  124;  hunting  on  a 
Derby  winner,  79  ;  killed  in  a  thun- 
derstorm, 255  ;  "  Lord  Grey,"  Dick 
Christian's  favourite,  261  ;  prices  of, 
73,  109 ;  putting  up  horses  for  sale 
after  dinner,  11  ;  studs,  17,  151,  205, 
255>  3°8  5  Turkish  bath,  a,  265 

Hounds. — Anecdotes  of  the  Lambton, 
179  ;  Atherstone  pack  brought  in,  the, 
104;  attempt  to  stake,  210;  Bedale, 
bought  by  Lord  Stamford,  the,  251  ; 
Belvoir  draft,  a,  127  ;  bought  for  the 
country,  359  ;  breeding,  49 ;  drafts, 
89;  Greene's  drafts,  Mr.,  204;  Greene's, 
sold,  Mr.,  216;  Hodgson's,  sold,  Mr., 
197 ;  Lambton's  bought  by  Lord 
Suftield,  Mr.,  177;  Musters's,  sold  to 
Mr.  A.  Smith,  Mr.,  92  ;  names  :  Alfred, 
334>  339  ;  Furrier,  105,  106  ;  Rattler, 
49)  33°  >  Vaulter,  107  :  narrow  escape 
■  m  the  railway,  271  ;  New  Forest,  Lord 
Southampton's  draft  from  the,  122; 
Norfolk  draft  bought  by  Sir  II. 
Goodricke,  148 ;  Oakley,  bought  by 
Lord  Southampton,  the,  126  ;  Os- 
baldeston's,  Mr.  G.,  104  et  set/.  ; 
poisoned,  369  ;  Quorn  hounds,  account 
of  the,  27  et  seq. ;  run  fox  by  them- 


selves, 327 ;  sale  of  Mr.  Clowes's, 
293 ;  Saville's  draft  bought  by  Sir 
H.  Goodricke,  Mr.,  148  ;  Shaw's 
hounds  bought  by  Sir  H.  Goodricke, 
Mr,,  148;  Shaw  Hellier'shounds  bought 
by  Lord  Stamford,  Mr.,  251  ;  Shows: 
Alexandra  Park,  338 ;  Birmingham, 
298,  299;  Driffield,  339;  Great  York- 
shire, 334  ;  Harrogate,  330  ;  Knaves- 
mire,  342  ;  Peterborough,  366,  369  ; 
Skipworth- in- Craven,  341  ;  Yarm, 
269:  sold  to  Lord  Chesterfield,  171  : 
Southampton's,  sold,  Lord,  148;  Stam- 
ford's drafts,  Lord,  251  ;  Sutton's,  Sir 
Richard,  221  ;  Sutton's,  sold,  Sir  R., 
244;  van,  Lord  Southampton's,  124, 
125  ;  Willes  sells  hounds  to  Mr.  Coup- 
land,  Mr.  Craven,  315 

Hunt  Ball,  the  first,  165  ;  revival  of, 
3Sl 

Hunt  Servants  (see  also  Anecdotes 
and  Accidents). — Bacon,  Sam,  251  ; 
Ball,  Tom,  166,  184 ;  Beers,  George, 

126,  127,  163,  166;  Boothroyd,  Ben, 
7,  238,  251,  252,  253,  302;  Burton, 
Dick,  113,  114,  123;  Buttress,  J., 
158 ;  Carter,  Geo.,  87,  SS  ;  Christian, 
Dick,  190,  273,  274  ;  Day,  Tom,  186, 
204;  Derry,  Will,  126,  127,  149,  151, 
166,  324 ;  Firr,  Tom,  327,  331 ;  Gil- 
lard,  F.,  303,  305 ;  Goddard,  John, 
306,  345;  Goodall,  Stephen,  71,  124; 
Harrison,  Joe,  75  ;  Jones,  Joseph,  46, 
51;  Macbride,  J.,  316;  Machin,  J., 
305,  316;  Maiden,  James,  251  ;  Mor- 
gan, Ben,  225  ;  Mountford,  Geo.,  126, 

127,  148,  149,  151,  166;  Onions, 
Roger,  303  ;  Payne,  Chas.  163,  164  ; 
Pike,  C,  299;  Raven,  John,  51,  71, 
72 ;  Shirley,  Jem,  243  ;  Treadwell, 
178,  253,  275;  Walker,  John,  315; 
Webb,  185,  186,  187  ;  Wilson, 
Thomas,  300;  Wingfield,  Tom,  71, 
75.  9i 

Jersey,    hunting   on   a    Derby    winner, 

Lord,  79 
Jones  (Joseph),  "Cork-legged,"  46,  51,75 

Kennels.  —  Billesdon,  24,  178,  204; 
Bowden  Inn,  23  ;  Oadby,  25 ;  Don- 
ington,  26  ;  Gardiner's  account  of  the 
Melton  kennels,  Mr.  Wm.,  25  ;  Hum- 
berstone  Gate,  24,  129;  Quorn,  23  et 
seq.)  250  ;  Quorndon  Hall,  23,  24,  129  ; 
Thrussington,  24,  143 


392 


INDEX 


Kirby  Gate,  the  last  of,  325 
Knight,  sudden  death  of  Mr.,  212 
Knockers,  collection  of  door,  13 

LANGTON  Hall,  23 

Larking  at  Melton,  18,  323 

Leaps,  big,  125,  190 

Leicester,  early  hunting  in,  36 

London  Farmers'  Club,  meeting  of,  309 

Loton,  unqualified  rider  of  winner  of  first 

G.N.H.  Steeplechase,  Mr.,  289 
Loughborough  Meet,  the,  381 
Lowesby  Hall,  177 

M's,  the  four,  1 1 

Map,  hunting,  210 

Masters  (other  than  Quorn).  —  Al- 
thorpe,  Lord,  164 ;  Chatham,  Lord, 
52;  Chesterfield,  Lord,  171;  Corbet, 
Mr.  Reginald,  38  ;  Darlington,  Lord, 
15  ;  Ferrers,  Earl,  43  ;  Greaves, 
Mr.  Henley,  222  ;  Haggerstone,  Sir 
Carnaby,  52 ;  Lambton,  Mr.  Ralph, 
10,  177;  Maberley,  Mr.,  232;  Mac- 
kenzie, Mr.  Austen,  376 ;  Mostyn, 
Sir  Thomas,  107  ;  Musters,  Mr.  J.  C, 
28,  92,  214,  323,  349 ;  Nicholls, 
Mr.,  122;  Noel,  Mr.,  45;  Payne, 
Mr.  George,  163  ;  Petre,  Lord,  148 ; 
Russell,  Mr.,  148;  Shaw,  Mr.,  148; 
Standish,  Mr.,  6;  Story,  Mr.  G.  B., 
5  ;  Sutton,  Mr.  Richard,  7,  238  ; 
Tailby,  Mr.,  8,  275,  295  ;  Talbot,  Mr. 
Theo.  Mansel,  6 ;  Tavistock,  Mar- 
quis of,  126;  Villebois,  Mr.,  194; 
Walker,  Mr.,  96;  Wynn,  Sir  Wat- 
kin,  164 

Meet,  a  great,  191,  192 

Meetings,  business,   139,   183,  244,  266, 

337,  346,  353,  36i 
Melton. — Austria,  Empress  of,  at,  334, 
344;  clique  at,  123;  clubs  at,  10, 
II;  fashions  at,  14;  four  M's,  the, 
II;  hotels  at,  13;  Hunt  Ball,  the, 
165,  381  ;  improvements  at,  148,  149  ; 
jumping  into  a  tobacconist's  shop  on 
horseback,  345 ;  kennels,  Mr.  Wm. 
Gardiner's  account  of  the,  25  ;  lark- 
ing at,  18,  323;  manners  and  customs, 
10  ;  Mowbray,  10  et  seq.  ;  Old  Club, 
the,  148  ;  pies,  324 ;  practical  joking 
at,  13;  Prince  of  Wales  at,  320,  32S, 
340  ;  putting  up  horses  for  sale  after 
dinner,  11  ;  the  Queen  at,  211; 
society  at,  148 ;  staghounds,  194 ; 
Steeplechase,  the  midnight,  15  ;  studs 


at,    17,    151,    205,    255,   308;    Sunday 
stable  parades,  16  ;  vehicles,  149 
Moore,  account  of  Mr.  John,  213 
Musters's,   Mr.,  hounds   clash  with  the 
Quorn,  214,  323 

Names.  —  Alvanley,  Lord,  12,  124; 
Anson,  General,  242 ;  Austria,  Em- 
press of,  334,  344;  Baird,  Sir  David, 
no,  165;  Batthyany,  Count,  265; 
Berkeley,  Mr.  Grantley,  104,  105, 
107;  Boothby,  "Prince,"  42;  Brude- 
nell,  Lord,  119  ;  Bullen,  Rev.  Edward, 
359;  Burdett,  Sir  Francis,  92,  212; 
Burgess,  Mr.,  163;  Burnaby,  Col., 
343;  Burnaby,  *  Gen.,  350;  Burnaby, 
Mr.  Y.  D.,  252;  Burnaby,  Rev.  A., 
252 ;  Cambridge,  Duchess  of,  239  ; 
Cambridge,  Duke  of,  211  ;  Campbell, 
Captain,  237, 372  ;  Campbell,  "Saddle," 
no;  Cardoro,  Madame,  159;  Cave, 
Hon.  Ottway,  213;  Chaplin,  Mr.  Ernest, 
369 ;  Chesterfield,  Lord,  323  ;  Childe, 
Mr.,  48;  Christian,  Dick,  109,  260, 
261;  Comber,  Mr.  Charles  ("The 
Flying  Cucumber"),  64,  65  ;  Corbett, 
Lady,  40;  Cotton,  Sir  Lynch,  43; 
Coupland,  Mrs.,  335  ;  Coventry,  Hon. 
H.,  329;  Coventry,  Mr.,  290;  Cra- 
dock,  Mr.,  95,  234,  382  ;  Delamere, 
Lord,  1 1  ;  Edward  of  Saxe-Coburg, 
Prince,  191,  193;  Ellar,  Mr.  James, 
156;  Empson,  Parson,  115;  Farnham, 
Mr.,  238;  Ferneley,  Mr.  J-  E.,  96, 
254 ;  Ford,  Dr.  (Melton  Parson),  47, 
96 ;  Forester,  Cecil,  48 ;  Forester, 
Lord,  10,  335  ;  Fouldes,  Benjamin, 
215;  Frewen,  Mr.,  304;  Gardner, 
Lord,  18,  176,  191,  213;  George 
IV.,  53,  54,  156;  Gilmour,  Mr. 
Little,  195,  230;  Glossop,  Mr., 
233;  Grant,  Sir  Francis,  166;  Gros- 
venor,  Lord  Robert,  156;  Gully,  Mr. 
John,  III;  Harborough,  Lord,  190; 
Hazelrigg,  Sir  Arthur  Grey,  350 ; 
Henry  VIII.,  77  ;  Herrick,  Mr.,  338  ; 
Heseltine,  Mr.  Andrew,  345 ;  Hey- 
cock,  Tom,  93 ;  Hopetoun,  Lord, 
329;  Inchley,  Tot,  118;  Jersey,  Lord, 
48,  79,  124,  260;  Johnstone,  Jamie, 
14;  Lambert,  Daniel,  80;  Maher, 
Mr.  Valentine,  n,  109,  170;  Manners, 
Lord,  89 ;  Mason,  Jem,  189 ;  Maxse, 
Mr.,  11,  no,  289;  Mellish,  Col.,  83; 
Meynell,  jun.,  Mr.,  66;  Moore,  Mr. 
John,    II,  213;  Musgrave,   Sir  James, 


INDEX 


393 


II,  17,  109;  Namick  Pasha,  159; 
Napoleon,  Louis,  229  ;  Neal,  Mr.,  43  ; 
Nemours,  Due  de,  211;  "Nimrod," 
177;  Osborne,  Mr.  Bernal,  133,  176; 
Owen,  Mr.  Smythe,  11  ;  Plymouth, 
Lord,  17,  108  ;  Prince  Consort,  269  ; 
Prince  of  Wales,  320,  328,  340 ;  Rad- 
cliffe,  Mr.  Delme,  156;  Rancliffe,  Lord, 
123,  158,  235;  Richards,  Mr.,  256; 
Ridley,  Sir  Matthew  White,  177; 
Ross,  Captain  Horatio,  363  ;  Row- 
land, Mr.,  V.S.,  195;  Russell,  Colonel, 
125;  Russell,  Rev.  John,  345;  Rut- 
land, the  Duke  of,  12,  89,  159;  St. 
Leger,  Major-Gen.,  49 ;  Sealey,  Sir 
Charles,  43 ;  Smith,  Captain,  289 ; 
Smith,  Mr.  Loraine,  73 ;  Smithies, 
Rev.  E.,  309;  Stamford,  Lady,  257; 
Stanley,  Sir  J.  Massey,  162;  Stephens, 
Mr.  Lyne,  16,  265  ;  Sutton,  Messrs.  F. 
and  R.,  244  ;  Tavistock,  Marquis  of, 
92  ;  Teck,  Duchess  of,  239  ;  Tweed- 
dale,  Marquis  of,  no;  Voeux,  Sir  H. 
Dalrymple,  376  ;  Waterford,  Lord,  13, 
160,  165,  168,  177,  260;  Webster, 
Dick,  189,  226  ;  Wellington,  Duke  of, 
no,  165  ;  White,  Captain,  94  ;  Wilton, 
Lord,  15,  18,  347;  Wombwell,  Sir 
George,  259 ;  Wyndham,  Col.,  206 ; 
York,  Duke  of,  53,  54 

Objection  to  winner  of  the  first  G.N.H. 

Steeplechase,  289 
Old  Club,  the,  10 
Opposition  to  the  Quorn  Hunt,  121 
Over-riding  hounds,  48 

Pictures. — Christian,  Dick,  261  ;  Firr, 
Tom,  349  ;  Greene,  Mr.  Henry,  208 ; 
Hodgson,  Mr.  Tom,  19S  ;  Inchley,  the 
horse-dealer,  118;  Meet,  the,  149: 
Meet  of  the  Quorn  Hounds  at  Baggrave 
Hall,  350;  Melton  Hunt  Breakfast, 
the,  166;  "My  Stud,"  149;  Osbalde- 
ston,  Mr.  George,  115;  Sutton,  Sir 
Richard,  240 

Poetry. — Billesdon  Coplow  Run,  the, 
55  ;  Chaunt  of  Achilles,  176  ;  Day  with 
Lord  Southampton's  Hounds,  a,  133  ; 
Dream  of  an  old  Meltonian,  the,  18  ; 
Epwell  Hunt,  the,  74 ;  Lays  of  the 
Belvoir  Hunt,  377  ;  Lowesby  Hall, 
377;  Melton  Hunt,  the,  96;  Meltonian 
Song,  144 

Politics  in  the  hunting-field,  303,  305 

Practical  joking  at  Melton,  13 


Prestwold  Covert  allowed  to  be  drawn  by 

the  Donington,  1S3 
Prince  of  Wales'  Gorse,  the,  320,  351 
Puppy  Show,  first  at  Quorn,  317 
Putting  up  horses  for  sale  after  dinner,  1 1 

Queen  at  Melton,  the,  211 

Queen's  staghounds  visit  the  Cottesmore 
country,  342 

Quorn  country,  account  of  the,  3  et  seq.  ; 
boundaries  of  the,  3  ;  part  absorbed  by 
the  Atherstone,  4 

Quorn  kennels,  the,  23  et  seq. 

Quorn  Masters  (see  also  Anecdotes). 
— Booth  by,  Mr.  Thomas,  35  et  seq. ; 
hunting-horn,  38 ;  lineage,  40,  41  ; 
original  pack,  27  ;  racing,  41  ;  tuning 
bells  to  resemble  the  cry  of  hounds,  39. 
Clowe.-;,  Mr.,  283  et  seq.  ;  bad  luck, 
283 ;  buys  Lord  Stamford's  hounds, 
283  ;  dinner  and  testimonial  to,  291  ; 
gives  history  of  his  mastership,  291-2  ; 
his  work  for  the  hunt,  2S4  ;  reported 
complaintabout  the  speed  of  his  hounds, 
286;  resignation,  291  ;  sells  his  hounds, 
293-4  ;  sport  in  his  second  season,  290  ; 
stopped  by  a  farmer,  290-1  ;  succeeds 
Lord  Stamford,  283.  COUPLAND,  Mr., 
315  et  seq.  ;  buys  the  Craven  hounds, 
315  ;  death  of  his  stepson,  321  ;  death 
of  Mrs.  Coupland,  335  ;  dinner  and 
payments  to  keepers  and  earth-stoppers, 
330  ;  Empress  of  Austria's  visit,  the, 
334-  344  :  hound  shows,  330,  334,  338, 
339>  341,  342  ;  ill  health,  345  ;  invites 
the  Blankney  hounds,  352 ;  member 
of  Coaching  Club  and  steeplechase 
rider,  316 ;  mutual  hunt  with  Mr. 
Musters's, -323  ;  opens  the  Leicester 
Horse  Repository,  340  ;  pack  run  a  fox 
by  themselves,  327  ;  places  thorough- 
bred stallion  at  the  farmers'  disposal, 
337  ;  Prince  of  Wales's  visit,  328,  340  ; 
presentation  to,  330,  353  ;  resigns,  346  ; 
runs,  332,  352;  sells  horses,  319,  326, 
329,  354 :  subscriptions,  333,  337  ; 
summoned  for  alleged  cruelty  to  a 
horse,  321  ;  vulpicide,  343  ;  wedding 
present,  344.  ERRINGTON,  Mr.  Row- 
land, 162  et  seq.  ;  an  amateur's  experi- 
ence at   Quorn,   169;  dinner  to,   163, 

170  ;  family,  162;  hounds,  164;  resigns, 

171  ;  runs,  164,  165  ;  sells  hounds  to 
Lord  Chesterfield,  1 7 1  ;  starts  the  Hunt 
Ball,  165  :  succeeds  Mr.  Holyoake 
Errington,   162;    "The    Mellon   Hunt 


394 


INDEX 


Breakfast,"  166;  "The  Meltonians," 
play  produced  at  Drury  Lane  Theatre, 
167  ;  visit  of  the  Duke  of  Wellington, 
165.  Foley,  Lord,  82  et  seq. ;  accident 
to,  82  ;  advertising  fixtures,  83  ;  death 
of,  84  ;  diceing,  83 .;  succeeds  Lord 
Sefton,  82.  Goodricke,  Sir  Harry, 
143  et  seq.  ;  buys  draft  from  Norfolk, 
148  ;  buys  Lord  Petre's  hounds,  148  ; 
buys  Mr.  Saville's  hounds,  148  ;  death 
of,  152;  digging  out  foxes,  1 50;  dinner 
to,  144;  Eton  days,  145  ;  horses,  147  ; 
hounds,  148  ;  hunts  at  his  own  expense, 
146 ;  kennels,  143  ;  members'  studs, 
151 ;  munificence  of,  146  ;  over-riding, 
151  ;  popularity  of,  147  ;  riding,  146, 
151  ;  runs,  150;  sells  Lord  South- 
ampton's hounds,  148 ;  succeeds  Lord 
Southampton,  139,  143.  Goodricke, 
Mr.  Holyoake,  154  et  seq.  ;  meet 
at  Belvoir  Castle,  159  ;  resigns, 
160;  rumoured  resignation,  158; 
runs,  155;  Russian  forces,  160; 
shooting,  155  ;  succeeds  Sir  Harry 
Goodricke,  154.  Graham,  Sir  Bel- 
lingham,  116  et  seq.;  accident,  117, 
120;  exchanges  with  Mr.  Osbal- 
deston,  112;  his  horses,  nS;  his 
many  masterships,  116;  resigns, 
120;  runs,  119,  120;  subscription, 
117;  succeeds  Mr.  Osbaldeston,  116. 
Greene,  Mr.  Henry,  203  et  seq.  ;  a 
bitter  letter,  208  ;  accident  to,  208  ; 
attempt  to  stake  hounds  and  horses, 
2IO;  death  of,  216;  his  drafts,  204; 
hounds,  204,  205  ;  mutual  run  with 
Mr.  Musters's,  214;  resigns,  216;  rid- 
ing, 205  ;  royal  visits,  211;  runs,  206, 
207 ;  sells  hounds  and  horses,  216 ; 
succeeds  Mr.  Hodgson,  203.  Hartopp, 
Captain  E.  Burns,  3S7.  Hastings, 
Marquis  of,  295  et  seq.  ;  buys  some 
of  Mr.  Clowes's  hounds,  295  ;  cedes 
some  country  to  Mr.  Tailby,  295  ; 
death  of,  303  ;  retirement  of,  300 ; 
sale,  301.  Hodgson,  Mr.  Thomas,  184 
et  seq. ;  alleged  lagging  in  the  field, 
187;  Mr.  Assheton  Smith's  visit,  191  ; 
authority  in  the  field,  1S9  ;  business- 
like establishment,  185  ;  death  of,  199; 
dinner,  185  ;  Lord  Gardner's  inter- 
ference, 191  ;  opposition  to,  190  ;  op- 
position to  Webb,  186,  1 87  ;  proposed 
mutual  draw  with  the  Quorn,  188  ; 
resigns,  196;  riding,  187;  Rowland, 
V.S.,  195;  runs,    188,    193,  196;  sells 


hounds  and  horses,  197  ;  subscriptions, 
198 ;  succeeds  Lord  Suffield,  184. 
Lonsdale,  Lord,  375  et  seq. ;  circulars, 
375  ;  famous  driving  feat,  382 ;  his 
interest  for  the  farmers,  375  ;  invites 
the  Woodland  Pytchley,  376  ;  meet 
in  the  Market-place,  Loughborough, 
380 ;  resigns,  385  ;  revives  the  Hunt 
Ball,  381  ;  rules  as  to  second  horse- 
men, 375  ;  succeeds  Captain  Warner, 
375.  Manners,  Lord,  357  et  seq. ; 
bad  luck,  358 ;  hounds  bought  for  the 
country,  357  ;  resigns,  360  ;  run,  35S  ; 
subscription,  354  ;  succeeds  Mr.  Coup- 
land,  357.  Meynell,  Mr.  Hugo,  43 
et  seq.  ;  accomplishments,  44  ;  Billes- 
don  Coplow  run,  the,  54 ;  boundary 
disputes,  45  ;  cock-fighting,  43  ;  cor- 
rectness of  ear,  64 ;  courtesy,  66 ; 
death  of,  66  ;  entering  hounds  to  hare, 
49  ;  entertaining,  48  ;  entertaining 
royalty,  53  ;  extravagance,  48  ;  former 
history  of  his  country,  37  ;  High  Sheriff, 
44 ;  hospitality  of,  44  ;  hound-breed- 
ing, 49  ;  hound  Rattler,  49  ;  hounds, 
46;  liberality,  47,48  ;  management  of 
fields,  47  ;  marriage  of,  45  ;  master  of 
the  Royal  buckhounds,  44  ;  over- 
riding, 47 ;  rabies,  53 ;  reported  de- 
sertion of  Leicestershire,  52  ;  riding, 
50 ;  runs,  48 ;  sells  hounds  to  Lord 
Sefton,  63  ;  subscribers,  47,  53. 
Musters,  Mr.  J.  C,  302  et  seq. ;  his 
command  of  field,  306,  307  ;  his  riding, 
307 ;  presentation  to,  by  earth-stoppers, 
308;  resignation  of,  309,310;  retire- 
ment of,  310,  31 1  ;  sale,  317.  Osbald- 
eston,  Mr.  George,  103  et  seq.  ;  acci- 
dent to,  112;  an  all-round  sportsman 
and  athlete,  115  ;  Belvoir  hound, 
Furrier,  105,  106;  Grantley  Berkeley 
and,  104  ;  brings  Atherstone  pack  with 
him,  104;  celebrated  riders,  109,  no, 
III;  criticisms  on,  104;  death  of, 
115;  dislike  to  timber,  III;  drafts 
from  the  Belvoir,  105  ;  exchanges  with 
Sir  Bellingham  Graham,  1 12;  famous 
ride,  115;  field  management,  105; 
former  masterships,  103,  104 ;  good 
terms  with  farmers,  108  ;  his  horses, 
114,  115;  hound  -  breeding,  103; 
hounds,  104  ;  hounds,  mute  and  im- 
patient, 107  ;  hunts  six  days  a  week, 
105;  riding,  114,  115  ;  run,  10S,  112, 
113,  114;  succeeds  Assheton  Smith, 
103.    Paget  (&e  Warner).    Sefton, 


INDEX 


395 


Lord,  71  et  seq. ;  buys  Mr.  Meynell's 
hounds,  71 ;  carriages,  75  ;  description 
of,  74  ;  driving,  74  ;  Greville's  descrip- 
tion of,  75  ;  magnificent  establishment, 
73 ;  Parisian  sportsmen,  80  ;  poor 
sport,  78 ;  resigns,  81  ;  riding,  74  ; 
second  horses,  77  ;  stable  lamps,  75  5 
two  packs  and  two  huntsmen,  71. 
Smith,  Mr.  Assheton,  85  et  seq.  ;  buys 
hounds  from  Mr.  Musters  and  the 
Belvoir,  89 ;  buys  Mr.  Musters's  hounds, 
92 ;  Gumley  coverts  and  Mr.  Cra- 
dock,  95  ;  language,  91  :  resigns,  96  ; 
return  visit  in  Mr.  Hodgson's  master- 
ship, 191  ;  riding,  86,  91,  93 ;  sub- 
scriptions, 92 ;  succeeds  Lord  Foley, 
85.  Southampton,  Lord,  121  et  seq.  ; 
accident  to  whippers-in,  126  ;  Belgrave 
Hall,  129 ;  buys  a  draft  of  hounds 
from  Mr.  Nicholls,  122  ;  buys  the 
Oakley  hounds,  126 ;  costume,  129  ; 
death  of  140;  hound-van,  124,  125; 
hounds,  122,  126  ;  hounds,  the  Belvoir 
draft,  127  ;  kennels,  129  ;  Melton 
clique,  the,  123;  resigns,  139;  runs, 
123,  124,  128,  131  ;  trouble  in  the 
country,  121,  122.  Stamford,  Earl  of, 
249  et  seq. ;  allowed  to  hunt  in  Staple- 
ford  Park,  262  ;  as  a  cricketer,  278  ; 
as  a  shot,  278;  Boothroyd,  251,  252, 
253 ;  Bradgate  Park,  250 ;  buys  the 
Bedaleand  Mr.  Shaw  Hellier's  hounds, 
251  ;  church  bells  rung  in  honour  of 
the  hounds,  272  ;  covert  improve- 
ments, 270 ;  family  of,  250  ;  his  sub- 
scription to  Mr.  Clowes,  27S  ;  hound 
show,  268;  hounds,  251  ;  Lady  Stam- 
ford, 257;  last  advertised  day,  276  ; 
life  and  death,  278  ;  narrow  escape 
of  the   hounds,  271  ;    presentation  to, 

267  ;  proposed  presentation  to,  276  ; 
rumoured  resignation,  259,  265  ;  runs, 
257,  258,  267,  270 ;  sale  of  hunters, 
277  ;    Sir   Harry   Goodricke's  Gorse, 

268  ;  subscriptions,  269  ;  succeeds  Sir 
R.  Sutton,  249  ;  Treadwell,  253  ; 
warned  off,  255.  Suffield,  Lord,  175 
et  seq.  ;  bailiffs  take  the  hounds  and 
horses,  182;  buys  the  Lambton  hounds, 
177  ;  extravagance,  178  ;  kennels,  178  ; 
Lowesby  Hall,  177  ;  reins,  180,  181  ; 
sells  hounds  and  horses,  182  ;  succeeds 
Mr.  Errington,  175;  turf  career,  175. 
Sutton,  Sir  Richard,  221  et  seq.  ; 
accident  to,  231  ;  accused  of  buying 
foxes,    231;     buys    Quorndon     Hall, 


234;  death  of,  241  ;  dispenses  with 
subscriptions,  234  ;  family  of,  241  ; 
floods,  237 ;  foxes  poisoned,  239 ; 
fracas,  a,  224 ;  gives  up  the  Har- 
borough  country  to  his  son,  238  ;  good 
shot,  a,  242  ;  horses  and  hounds  sold, 
244;  hounds,  221;  hunt  carried  on 
by  his  sons,  243  ;  hunting  expenditure, 
222 ;  hunts  six  days  a  week,  238  ; 
Morgan,  Ben,  225  ;  opposition  to,  227  ; 
royal  visitors,  229,  239 ;  runs,  228, 
229,  232,  236,  238  ;  shooting -match 
with  General  Anson,  242 ;  succeeds 
Mr.  Greene,  221  ;  vulpicide,  227  ; 
wishes  to  resign,  240.  Warner,  Cap- 
tain, 361  et  seq. ;  action  against,  373  ; 
hound-poisoning,  369 ;  hound  show, 
366,  369;  issues  circular  for  guidance 
of  the  field,  371  ;  joined  by  Mr.  B. 
Paget,  369  ;  presentation  to,  373 ; 
resigns,  373  ;  runs,  364,  367,  368,  371  ; 
sells  horses,  374  ;  subscriptions,  361  ; 
succeeds  Lord  Manners,  361  ;  the 
farmers'  protest,  361 

Quorndon  Club,  the,  10 

Quomdon  Hall,  45,  234 

Rabies,  Mr.  Meynell  on,  53 

Railways,  234,  322 

Rider,  a  heavy,  194 

Rowland,   Mr.,   the  veterinary  surgeon, 

195 

Run,  an  adventurous,  331 

Runs,  46,  54,  76,  77,  89,  90,  108,  112, 
113,  114,  119,  120,  123,  124,  128,  131, 
150>  155,  180,  181,  188,  193,  196,  206, 
207,  214,  228,  229,  232,  236,  238,257, 
258,  267,  270,  276,  286,  290,  297,  298, 
300,  319.  323,  352,  358,  364,  367,  368, 

37i 
Rutland.  Duke  of,  and  representation  of 
North  Leicestershire,  303,  304 

Scarlet  coats,  when  first  used,  14 
Second  horsemen  and   Lord  Lonsdale, 

375  ;  first  introduction  of,  77 
Smith,    Captain,    rides    winner    of    first 

G.N. II.  Steeplechase,  289 
Smithies,  Rev.   E. ,  on  hunting  damage, 

309 

Stable  lamps.  75 

Staghounds,  bought  by  Lord  Waterford 
from  Mr.  Villebois  to  hunt  round  Mel- 
ton, 194;  proposed  pack,  119;  visit 
of  the  Queen's  to  the  Cottesmore 
country,  342 


396 


INDEX 


Steeplechase,  first  Grand  National  Hunt, 

288,289;  midnight,  15 
Subscriptions,  47,  53,  92,  117,  158,  198,. 

269,  333-  337.  353,  361 
Sundays  in  the  Melton  stables,  16 
Swimming  the  Severn,  319  ;  the  Wreake, 

3i8 

Tailby,  Mr.,  takes  some  country  from 
Marquis  of  Hastings,  295  ;  see  also 
Masters 

Theatricals,  44,  167  ;  private,  44,  263, 
264,  265 

Tooley  Park,  39 

Vulpicide,  227,  343 


Warner,  Sheppard,  and  Wade's  Horse 
Repository,  opening  of  Messrs.,  340 

Waterford,  Lord,  starts  a  pack  of  stag- 
hounds,  194;  see  also  Names 

Weight  riders,  124 

Wellington.  Duke  of,  visits  Leicestershire, 

165 
Wheat,  prices  of,  51 
White,  Captain  ("  Leicestershire  White "), 

riding,  94 
Wilton,   Lord,  improves   the   society  at 

Melton,  1 5 ;  larking  at  Melton,  1 8 ;  Lord 

Grey  de,  summoned  for  damage,  33^ 
Wire  fencing,  285,  287 
Woodland  Pytchley,  the,  visit  the  Quorn 

Country,  376 


ERRATA 


Page  6, 

,,  25, 

„  28, 

„  36, 

»»  39, 

„  47, 

„  9i, 


,,  127, 
,,  129, 
,,  148, 
.,  234, 
„  238, 
,,  249, 
,,  252, 
,,  296, 
,,  331, 
„  354, 
„  366, 


line  10,  for  '  Healey '  read  '  Henley.' 
19,  for  '  Gadsby '  read  '  Gaddesby.' 

4  from  bottom,  for  'Nicholls'  read  '  Nicoll.' 
11,  for  'Throsley'  read  'Throsby.' 
10  from  bottom,  for  '  Muster's  '  read  '  Musters's.' 

2  ,,  for  '  head  '  read  '  lead.' 
8           ,,  for  'cannon '  read  'canon.' 

5  ,,  for  '  Brawnston  '  read  '  Braunstone.' 
17,  for  '  Cleaves  '  read  '  Eaves.' 
13,  for  '  rigueur '  read  '  rigeur.' 
12  from  bottom, yfrr  'T.  Moore'  read  'J.  Moore.' 

3  and  10  from  bottom,  for  'Craddock  '  read  '  Cradock.' 
3  from  bottom,  for  '  Counterthorpe  '  read  '  Countesthorpe. 

250,  251,  294,  305, for  'Storey'  read  'Story.' 
286,  for  'Ashfordby'  read  '  Asfordby. ' 
line  19,  for  'Trussells'  read  'Trussels.' 
332,  336,  for  'Lord  W7ilton  '  read  '  Lord  Grey  de  Wilton.' 
line  2  from  bottom,/^-  '  Shephard  '  read  '  Sheppard.' 
,,     2  ,,  for  'Johnston'  read  'Johnstone. ' 


Printed  by  Ballantyne,  Hanson  if  Co. 
Edinburgh  6s  London 


iter  Family  Library  of  Veterinary  Medicine 
nings  School  of  Veterinary  Medicine  at 
rsity 


*' 


5