181 ij EUN FROM- BURTON HILL. 4JJ 



wliicli cannot go along a slapping- pace, stay at that pace, skim ridge and 

 furrow, catdi his horses, top a flight of rails, come well into the next field, 

 charge an ox fence, go in and out clever, face a brook, swish a rasper, and, in 

 short, do all that kind of thing — phrases so plain and intelligible that 

 it's impossible to mistake their meaning. That horse is held in tlie same 

 contempt in Leicestershire as a coxcoml) holds a country bumpkin. 



In vulgar countries {i.e., all others), where these accomplishments are 

 not indispensable, he may be a hunter. 



(Signed) Billesdon Coplow. 



We should like to have taken " Billesdon Coi)low " to 

 the toj) of Shuckburgh Hill, and to have asked hiin to ride 

 eight miles straight in any direction to ascertain whether 

 he considered it a vulgar country. 



The first good run recorded with Lord Middleton's 

 hounds was on February .2 .'2nd, 1811. The meet was at 

 Farnborough. The hounds found at Burton Hill, and ran 

 at best pace through Knightcote Bottom, and thence to the 

 right over Fenny Compton Fields, through Wormleighton 

 Bottoms, and on to Boddington Hill. They ran next 

 through the covert, and to Harclwick Field, and from 

 there to Eed Hill Wood, where the first and only check 

 occurred. A fresh fox was viewed away from the covert, 

 and the pack divided, in C()nse(|uence of which the hunted 

 fox was lost.''' "A^enator" in verse describes the same 

 run. 



BY "VENATOR." 



Wheu tlie morn stands on tiptoe 'twixt mountain and sky. 

 How pleasant to follow the hounds in full cry ! 

 When the bright spangling dewdrops the meadows adorn, 

 How delightful to follow the hounds and the horn ! 



While at the glass dull squeamish beaus 

 Adjust with girlish pride their clothes ; 

 Or idly chaunt the morn away, 

 Trimming their whiskers, black or grey ! 

 Give me, well horsd, the chance to seek 

 Rude health o'er hill or vallev bleak ; 



* We publish the account of the same run in verse, by " Venator," not because we 

 admire his poetry, but for the reason that there is so much of it in his book we think 

 it best to give a specimen of it. 



