138 



The Chase 



Egerton-Warburton ^z^ sc?^ >,o 



(The Laureate of Hunting) 



WARBURTON, himself, had a kindly 

 sympathy with all field-sports, but his 

 darling pursuit was fox-hunting. As he tells us 

 himself in one of his best songs : — 



Fishiiii^, though pleasant, I sing not at present, 

 Nor shooting the pheasant, nor fighting of cocks ; 

 Song shall declare a way how to drive care away, 

 Pain and despair away — hunting the fox. 



He generally rode thoroughbred horses bred by 

 himself, and bestowed incessant care upon breaking 

 and training them ; but one cannot read his poems 

 without feeling convinced that his affection was 

 bestowed as ardently upon hounds as it was upon 

 horses. It was one who rode to hunt, not one who 

 hunted to ride, that wrote the following stanza (less 

 musical than most from that pen) : — 



The fox takes precedence of all from the cover ; 



The horse is an animal purposely bred 



After the pack to be ridden — not over ; 



Good hounds are not rear'd to be knocked on the head. 



Though the prowess of others in the hunting 

 field is liberally celebrated and humorously criticised 

 in Warburton's lays, upon his own quality as a 

 horseman he is modestly silent. Almost alone 

 among field-sports, fox-hunting is free from the 

 detestable taint of record-breaking, and owing to its 

 very nature, must remain so while it endures. How 

 long that may be defies computation. . . . 



His later years were darkened by a grievous 

 affliction. No more might his eye rest lovingly on 

 the shapes of horse and hound, nor be gladdened by 



