THE END OF BUCKINGHAM. 41 



pack to their present status. Even now they send a few 

 hounds to Bilsdale and occasionally to Farndale, whilst the 

 latter packs employ each other's stallion hounds, and 

 occasionally have a joint meet. Perhaps few hunts have 

 maintained through varying huntsmanships the characteris- 

 tics of their pack as have the Farndale. They have always 

 been essentially hound men — as is the case in Bilsdale to-day 

 — and they have always bred so as to produce hounds as 

 light-coloured as possible. 



Mr. W. S. Dixon says of the Bilsdale hunting-men of 

 the generation which is past : — 



They are eminently hound men, but would most probably judge 

 a hound from a different standpoint to the fashionable standard of the 

 present day. We do not suppose they would be particularly fastidious 

 about a hound being straight, but a good nose and plenty of cry are 

 indispensable. They have had a few drafts from the Bedale, Sinnington 

 and Hurworth, but they prefer their own blood, affirming that it suits 

 the country best, and they will go a long way to get a hound which 

 they have reason to believe is descended from the Duke of Buckingham's 

 pack. 



To revert, however, to the Farndale and their light- 

 coloured pack, Sir A. E. Pease, in his history of the " Cleve- 

 land Hounds as a Trencher-fed Pack," not only gives us an 

 opinion regarding the breeding of light-coloured hounds for 

 hilly countries, but also seems to attribute the Duke of 

 Buckingham's Hunt, at any rate in a measure, as being 

 answerable for the foundation of the Roxby Foxhounds, 

 which, after becoming the " Roxby and Cleveland Hounds," 

 evolved into the Cleveland, by which name they are now 

 known. Sir Alfred Pease, who is one of the best sportsmen, 

 hardest men across a country, and as great-hearted a fellow 

 as ever threw leg over a saddle, or was proud to call himself 

 a Tyke, says : — 



Where the hounds that formed the Roxby Pack came from I have 

 endeavoured, but failed, to discover, but in all probability they were 

 originally harriers, hunting hare and pursuing a fox when occasion 

 arose, and afterwards crossed and improved by admixture with the 

 fox-hounds that George Villiers, Duke of Buckingham, brought into 

 banishment with him, and hunted in the neighbourhood of Helmsley. 

 From these hounds the Bilsdale hounds derive their origin, and probably 



