CHAPTER XII. 



THE FARNDALE. 



The following chapter cannot be taken as anything approach- 

 ing an historical survey of this interesting pack, and I regret 

 that I must make this admission at the outset. Notwithstand- 

 ing the fact that I have seen or otherwise communicated with 

 almost everyone whom I had reason to believe could assist me 

 in arriving at some sort of decision as to the origin of this pack 

 and the various chapters in their history, I find on placing 

 the whole of my notes in order to edit them that only a 

 meagre story can be unfolded, and at the same time an 

 incomplete one. Not a single diary or scrap of writing has 

 come my way during the course of the search made, 

 and no one whom I have interviewed can go any further 

 back, either of their own knowledge or from what they have 

 heard, than the period when old Joe Duck was at the head 

 of affairs in connection with the Farndale Hunt. Baily's 

 Hunting Directory, which, as a rule is remarkably accurate, 

 tells us the hunt dates from 1835, and though I am firmly 

 convinced that there were hounds in Farndale long prior to 

 this date, no data can be produced to prove that this was so. 

 It is generally claimed that when the Duke of Buckingham 

 died, his tenantry continued to hunt, and that the Sinnington, 

 Bilsdale, and Farndale packs spontaneously came into being. 

 So far as the first two hunts are concerned, a fairly clear case 

 can be shown in support of the theory, but with regard to 

 the Farndale it is more difficult. Of course, at this period 

 — after George Villiers' death — packs were more personal 

 than local, and the Sinnington Hounds were maintained 

 by the Duncombe family. There was in Farndale 

 no family able to maintain a pack, nor is it likely that, 

 except by accident, the Duncombe Hounds would break 

 the isolation of this dale — which is now, as was the case then, 



