1 82 The Chase 



for it." On another occasion he exclaimed, " Why- 

 do you lie there, howling and exposing yourself?'* 

 addressing a rustic whom his horse had slightly- 

 kicked. " My dear Tom," remarked his more 

 feeling friend, Mr. Henry Pierrepont, "the man is 

 hurt, and why so rough on him ? " "On principle^'' 

 rejoined the Squire. " If I had pitied him, he would 

 have been there for a week, but now you see he is 

 up and well already." 



"I like to see Squire Smith with the horn on 

 his saddle," said Marsh the sporting shoemaker, 

 "for he does things as should be. If he kills a 

 fox he kills him, and if he loses one he loses him. 

 He does not do as Ben Foot [the Craven huntsman] 

 does — go muttering after him all day long, and 

 worriting him to death at last." Persons in Marsh's 

 sphere of life form a very accurate estimate of men 

 and things, and as they can feel no jealousy there 

 is no faintness in their praise. . . . 



" As a huntsman," said one who well knew 

 what a combination of qualities is necessary for 

 the attainment of excellence in that department of 

 the science of fox-hunting, " I fearlessly put Mr. 

 Smith in the first class ; he has all the requisites 

 to make him such : zeal, quickness of perception, 

 untiring perseverance, a ready judgment when in 

 difficulty, and horsemanship quite unequalled for 

 daring and duration by any man of this or any 

 other age. . . ." The following anecdote was 

 related by Mr. Child, a Hampshire yeoman of the 

 right sort, who always had a fox for Mr. Smith 

 in Wilster Wood: "The first time Mr. Smith 

 ran a fox into the Newbury Vale, I and some 

 friends, seeing he pointed for the meadows near 

 East Woodhay, got forward to a tremendous leap, 

 that had often stopped the whole Craven Hunt. 



