THE EIGHTH DUKE 



" getting their heads up, I could not get them 

 settled again for ten minutes, and the fox went 

 away." The afternoon was late and the dusk of a 

 December evening coming down, so the Duke had 

 to take the hounds off. The longer I hunt the 

 more I value silence on the part of every one in 

 the field except the huntsman. " We could not," 

 the diary goes on, " have failed to kill him if the 

 whips had been kept quiet." 



There is a very interesting note on December 

 26th of the same year : " Had out Lord Henry Ben- 

 tinck's old Contest. Is a capital drawer. Did 

 a great deal of good work and came home very 

 fresh." This hound was a great favourite with 

 Lord Henry, who says of him : " Contest 48. A 

 model and most brilliant animal, noted for his 

 hard running, flying his gates without touching 

 them, and for turning without the need of a drag 

 chain." This hound was by Comus, which Lord 

 Henry Bentinck describes as a model dog, and goes 

 back to Mr. Osbaldeston's Ranter, and to Crazy, 

 *' very crooked," but " ran a capital bitch until 

 eight years old." 



Again we find a fox, that the huntsman and 

 hounds had fairly earned, saved by an untimely 

 halloa. Truly silence is golden in a fox-hunter, 

 possibly because so rare. 



Another day was spoilt by a shooting tenant 

 choosing Christmas Day, of all days in the year, to 

 shoot his coverts. 



181 



