X. PREFACE. 



whose " Cleveland Hounds as a Trencher fed pack," is con- 

 tinually quoted, and to Mr. Dixon, from whose " In the 

 North Countree," I have taken much of interest. Mr. 

 Thomas Parrington — a grand old sportsman — Mr. Marcus 

 Kendall, Mr. Alfred Pearson, Mr. Penn C. Sherbrooke, Vis- 

 count Helmsley, Mr. F. Wilson Horsfall, Mr. Robert Garbutt 

 (Seive Green, Bilsdale), Mr. C. E. Mills, Mr. R. Barr (Leeds), 

 Mr. E. R. Turton, Mr. W. Pearson, Mr. Swarbreck (Bedale), 

 and many others have all lent most valuable assistance. 

 Mr. Howard Pease, the author of one or two historical novels, 

 has kindly read over the chapters which have reference to 

 the Duke of Buckingham, on whose epoch Mr. Pease, a 

 well-known Northumberland Nimrod, is an authority. 

 Mr. T. Parrington has read through some of the proofs of 

 the chapters on the Sinnington Hunt, and other sportsmen 

 have performed the same kind office. Mr. Noel T. B. 

 Turner is responsible for a good deal of the artistic work, 

 and to him a word of acknowledgment is due. To my father, 

 who has placed at my disposal his collection of hunting 

 songs and manuscripts regarding the Helmsley and Kirby- 

 moorside localities, I must express my obligation. 



These particularly, but many others also, have helped 

 to follow the line of my fox at times when he seemed to have 

 disappeared, leaving no trace of any kind. It has been an 

 old-fashioned slow hunt (unlike the galloping steeplechase of 

 to-day), and though I have accounted for my fox, there 

 are those occasional lapses which so often occur when we 

 are really not quite certain where the quarry went. Since 

 I first commenced this history, many of the principal charact- 

 ers have gone to their happy hunting ground, carrying with 

 them much that is interesting regarding the lore and 

 legend of our sport. Now it would be well-nigh impossible 

 to attempt such a work as this since each year sees the 

 end of Nimrods, each of whom had a wealth of information 



