THE BRANDYWINE 



private packs in the vicinity, with the double object of increasing our kennels 

 and our country. At no time during the fifteen years of my Mastership 

 was the Hunt without a good pack of native hounds. For several seasons 

 I was my own huntsman, and continued to hunt the hounds on various oc- 

 casions while I held office there. In 1 889, being in England, I brought 

 over five couples of English hounds and hunted them with the others, and 

 considered that it improved the general work of the pack. 



" In the spring of 1891, just at the close of the hunting season, our entire 

 pack of twenty-five couples of most excellent hounds, which I had been 

 selecting for years, was destroyed by rabies ; but by the time the hunting 

 season came round in the fall I had again secured two of the adjacent 

 packs. 



" In the fall of 1 892, 1 secured the Belvoir draft for the year — ^young and 

 old — thirty-one couples in all, which I purchased and maintained at my own 

 expense, while they were at Radnor. My first huntsman was Frank Gil- 

 lard, Jr., son of the noted Belvoir huntsman, and later, Alfred Loder ; in fact, 

 at no time have I had other than English huntsmen, my present one, William 

 Thompson, having been late huntsman to Lord Fitzhardinge's pack, the Old 

 Berkeley, said to be one of the best working packs in the Kingdom. 



" From 1 892 to 1 897, native and English packs were hunted together or 

 separately, as it might chance. By 1 897, the land in Radnor township be- 

 coming very valuable and more thickly settled each year, I was tempted to 

 migrate to a more open country, about eighteen miles to the south and 

 located on the Brandywine River in Chester County, transferring my hounds 

 — the Belvoir draft — to that location, where they have since been known 

 as ' The Brandywine Hounds.' " 



In 1 90 1 , Mr. Mather resigned his office as Master of the Radnor, after a 

 period of fourteen years, and since that time has devoted his attention to 

 breeding a type of hound which, in his opinion, is best suited to the country 

 over which he hunts. He has met with great success and the Brandywine 

 Hounds today are the oldest pure-blooded pack in the United States. 



From time to time, Mr. Mather has imported a new stallion hound from the 

 Belvoir, but has never sullied his pack with an introduction of inferior blood. 



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