210 HUNTING REMINISCENCES 



simply racing for thirty- five minutes, the field 

 having to ride their hardest to keep them in view, 

 running a ring by Rauceby, Silk Willoughby, 

 Aswarby Park, Culverthorpe, ending with a kill in 

 the open near to the Northing Plantation. The 

 brush was presented to Mr. John Gubbins, an ex- 

 M.F.H. from Ireland, driven away by agrarian 

 agitation to Grantham's gain, for he built stables 

 and kept a fine stud of hunters. Mr. Gubbins, 

 who won the Derby of 1897 with Galtee More, 

 was a heavy weight, hard to beat across country, 

 pounding the field on several occasions, the Bottes- 

 ford Beck being one big place which gave him the 

 coveted ambition of being alone with hounds. 

 The mask of this good fox went to another very 

 determined thruster of the farmer division Mr. 

 Cecil Rudkin of Sapperton, and custodian of that 

 reliable covert. During the run he took three 

 falls, the first being in an attempt to charge 

 through a great bullfinch black as Erebus, the 

 thorns wrapping round the horse instead of giving 

 way, sending him end over end. The second fall 

 was at a trappy fence with a double dyke, which 

 caught fifteen riders all in a row. And the third 

 was near the finish, when the heavy plough 

 knocked the wind out of the horses, and each 

 fence brought them down like ninepins. 



The sport we see before Christmas turns is far 

 better than what falls to our lot after, for we love 

 the short, dark, dirty days which characterise 

 November and December. This particular month 

 was full of good things, and on December 14th we 



