112 HUNTING REMINISCENCES 



and nothing else, so it was always safe to cheer 

 when he was heard." 



The New Year brought with it excellent sport, 

 and on January 9th a fine gallop from Melton 

 Spinney is recorded. A fox was immediately set 

 going, crossing the brook in a line for Old Hills, 

 where he turned and recrossed the railway and 

 brook at Scalford. The navvies were at work on 

 the new railway by Newport Lodge, and turned 

 him so that he made his way back to the starting- 

 point and saved his brush by shifting responsibilities 

 on to the shoulders of a friend. It was one of the 

 best runs of the season, and at racing pace for fifty 

 minutes. Out of the large field of the morning 

 very few turned up at the finish, and these were 

 Captain Smith, Mr. John Welby on a 15 -hand 

 3 -inch blood horse, Mr. Allcard, Mr. James 

 Hutchinson, and Mrs. Sterling. 



A good Leicestershire hunt was scored on 

 January 16th, and one of the field enjoying cross- 

 country work as a holiday was Fred Archer, 

 staying at Melton. The afternoon fox led the 

 way from Coston Covert by Stonesby, hounds 

 travelling very fast down to the brook below 

 Waltham to within a field of Goadby Gorse, 

 where he turned and recrossed the brook back 

 again to Waltham. "I stopped them there," 

 Frank records, " for I had lost both my whippers- 

 in, and the only one left to see the finish was 

 Mr. Micklethwaite, who had gone well all through 

 and taken his regulation number of falls. Mr. 

 'Banker' Hardy also came up, and these two 



