172 England's oldest hunt. 



dancin' will not do much 'untin'," but I think, so far as 

 Farndale is concerned, they have proved him wrong. No 

 reference to the dale hunt would be complete without mention 

 of the hunt balls. There are three every year — one at 

 Rosedale, one at Castleton, and one in the dale which gives 

 the hunt its name. Business here is combined with pleasure, 

 for these functions contribute their quota to the hunt funds. 

 Very homely, and, in consequence, very enjoyable functions 

 they are, too. Every follower of the pack who has a fox 

 mask or brush brings it, together with some of his wife's 

 confections for the supper afterwards, whilst in Farndale, 

 I have seen here and there the head of a badger mingling with 

 those of Reynard, brock being plentiful in these hill coun- 

 tries. Evening dress is not essential here, nor has the hunt 

 club an evening dress of its own. The Nimrods, therefore, 

 " trip it " as fantastically as they can in top boots and 

 white breeches. When the pianist and fiddler are anxious 

 for a rest — the dancers are never tired — then some one 

 sings a hunting song, and the whole company join in the 

 chorus. They are good dancers, too, in the dales, being 

 inducted into the mysteries of the art at a very early age, 

 on the stone-floored kitchens of their homes, to the strains 

 of a melodeon. On then, do they dance, till four o'clock or 

 after, then an hour or two's sleep brings with it daylight 

 and the sound of the horn — for hounds always meet on the 

 morning following one of these dances. There is poetry in 

 all this, and the social side of hunting in this old-world land 

 savours of the past just as does the sport itself. Indeed, 

 Sir A. E. Pease told us in his book on the Cleveland 

 Hounds : — 



" Anyone who would see last century foxhunting at the present 

 day, and how the rough countries of Yorkshire were hunted generations 

 ago, cannot do better than have a day with these old trencher-fed 

 packs, for the Farndale and Bilsdale countries have not felt those 

 changes that time has wrought in other parts." 



May it be long before the conditions alter, say I. 



that hounds were lost to view and were not recovered till next morning. 

 Two seasons ago the Bedale pack wes lost on the moors near Masham, 

 and their whereabouts not known till a wire came from Pateley Bridge 

 the following day. 



