268 MEMOIR OF 



Russell was asked by a gentleman present which 

 of the two he considered the better sportsman, 

 the Duke of Beaufort or Lord Portsmouth ? 

 His reply was, "They are the two best in 

 England — you cannot give a wrinkle to either ; 

 and if I place the Duke of Beaufort first, it 

 is only in deference to his rank." 



Again, in West Devon, the Honourable Mark 

 Rolle, on the retirement of Mr. John Moore 

 Stevens in 1858, took possession of the Tor- 

 rington country ; and, with the help of some 

 valuable hounds from the Cleveland and Rufford 

 kennels, established by degrees the noble pack 

 which has since attained so much celebrity. 



Then, about the same time, there arose a 

 third pack, which, started by Lord Poltimore, 

 with Russell as his chief counsellor, acquired so 

 wide-spread a fame during the short time they 

 hunted the country that, when they were sold, 

 the price they fetched astonished even "Tom 

 Pain " himself. His lordship, in reference to 

 the subject of this memoir, thus writes of him : 

 "When I first began keeping hounds, in 1857, 

 he taught me much, and was of the greatest 

 possible assistance to me ; but, on removing 

 into Dorsetshire and taking my hounds with 

 me, I then saw less of him, except when 

 he came on his annual visits, than in former 

 days. His intuitive knowledge of the run of a 

 fox, even in a country strange to Russell, was 



