1824] EUN FROM ALVESTON PASTURES. 71 



very easily caug-ht the fox by running-, and l)otli the fox and the dog wore 

 taken to a gentleman's house in the neighbourhood, where the fox died ; and 

 it was afterwards ascertained that the hound belonged to the Duke of Gordon, 

 and that the fox was started on the morning of the King's birthday on the 

 top of those hills called Mond-liadh, which separates Badenoch from Fort 

 Augustus. From this it appeared that the chase lasted /oh r c?rt(/s, and that 

 the distance travelled from the place where the fox was unkennelled to the 

 spot where it was caught, without making any allowance for doul)les, crosses, 

 and tergiversations, and as the crow Hies, exceeded seventy miles. 



This reniiiRls us somewhat of the sahnoii Usher, who 

 remarked to his " gillie " that he could not understand why 

 they caught so many larger fish on a neighbouring river. 

 "No doubt," he said, "they are better fishermen on that 

 river." " They are better lears (liars) you mean," answered 

 the Scotchman. 



"Hark Forward" relates that during the season of 

 1824 Mr. Shirley met a large field at Alveston Pastures. 

 The hounds were no sooner put into the covert than a line 

 old wild fox went away towards Fir Grove. He then sunk 

 tlie uplands, and crossed the Vale and the Stour, running 

 on to Preston Bushes, and then through Admington and 

 Quinton, and to the top of Meon Hill, where the first 

 check occurred ; and by the time the pack hit the scent oft' 

 the fox had got a long way ahead, and the run continued 

 at a slower pace again over the Vale as far as Pebworth, 

 where the fox was lost, but he was eventually killed by a 

 sheepdog. Mr. John Lucy, * on Merry-Go-Eound, a 



* No annals of the Warwickshire Hunt would be complete without a more 

 prolonged notice of the Rev. John Lucy. He was the third son of the Rev. John 

 Hammond, who was grandson of Alice, daughter of Sir Fulke Lucy, who married the 

 Rev. John Hammond, rector of Gowsworth, near Congleton, in Cheshire. His father 

 was vicar of Charlecote, and afterwards rector of Hampton Lucy, and, having succeeded 

 to the Charlecote Estate on the death of his relation, George Lucy, in 1780, took the 

 name of Lucy by His Majesty George HI.'s sign manual, dated 'Jth of February, 1787. 

 The subject of our memoir was educated at Winchester and Trinity College, Cambridge. 

 He was ordained in 1814, and in 1815 became rector of Hampton Lucy, liis father 

 (who lived to the age of eighty-nine, and died January 12th, 1823) having resigned 

 in his favour. Here he lived till his death, which took place in 18(59, at the age of 

 seventy-nine. He was a sporting parson, not altogether of the old school, for his 

 manners were most refined, and in the interest he took in ecclesiastical work, and 

 especially church restoration, lie was far before his time. We have heard that he 

 visited every cathedral in England and Wales in a dog-cart. His great work was the 

 rebuilding of St. Peter's Church at Hampton Lucy, the beautiful apse being added 

 entirely at his own cost. At the close of his life he contributed largely to the 

 restoratiou of St. David's Cathedral, of which, to his great gratification, he was made 



