THE ESSEX FOXHOUNDS. 



kept hounds there until his death in 1853, when the con- 

 nection of Copt Hall with the pack came to an end. 



Uurino; the lifetime of Mr. Conyers, sen., father of 

 Mr. Henry John Conyers, the master of the Essex, Copt 

 Hall was the subject of a burglary committed in the year 

 1775. The coachman Chapman was in league with the 

 robbers, of whom the chief was one Lambert Reading, and 

 they were by him given all necessary information. The 

 band travelled from London by hackney coach, effected the 

 robbery, and, with their booty, hurried back to London 

 with all speed. The sound of a hackney coach rattling 

 through Stratford in the dead of night aroused the sus- 

 picion of a certain wakeful magistrate, who had the fore- 

 thought to take the number, and on hearing of the burglary 

 at Copt Hall, communicated with Mr. Fielding, a neigh- 

 bouring J. P. The information thus given led to the de- 

 tection of the gang, their trial and subsequent execution 

 at Chelmsford — Chapman and his wife suffering with them. 



Easton Lodge, near Dunmow, has a brilliant hunting 

 record. The second Viscount Maynard, who died in 1824, 

 when upwards of seventy years of age, was described by a 

 Master of the Essex Hounds, the famous Colonel John 

 Cook, as "a strict preserver of foxes, and one of the best 

 of men." When Col. Cook was unable to keep on the 



