THE GRAFTON 



hounds throughout New England, with a scattering of outside members, has 

 done, and is doing, the best it can ; but no two judges think alike, and so long 

 as American hound men keep coming to the owners of English hounds for 

 a bit of their good blood there will be no definite standard. 



In 1 905, just prior to the Match, a Hound Show was held at Grafton, 

 the classification being similar to that of the Peterboro Hound Show in 

 England, and the arrangements much the same on a small scale. There 

 were a few American hounds, and only two English packs — the Norfolk 

 and the Middlesex — were represented ; but the Show, which was held in 

 conjunction with the Grafton Country Club Horse Show, was a distinct 

 success, and led to the holding, in the following year, of the National Fox- 

 hound Show at South Lincoln, which has now become an annual fixture. 



Mr. Smith sold about six couples of his hounds to the Orange County 

 Hunt, and they were kept in the South and hunted in their Virginia country 

 with great success, while he retained a sufficient number of bitches to breed 

 his present pack, which consists of fifteen couples. These hounds are Bel- 

 voir tan in color and are some twenty inches in height at the shoulder — 

 about the size of English harriers. 



The home country surrounding the Grafton kennels in Massachusetts, is 

 the worst possible for fox-hunting. Very rough pastures, enclosed by big, 

 ragged stone walls, furnishing the only open country, and a series of immense 

 swamps and woodlands make it impossible to follow hounds fairly. 



Mr. Smith thinks that the best type of horse is a well-mannered, clean- 

 bred, " which cannot only stand off and jump, but also stand still and jump, and 

 creep if necessary." The attitude of the landowners is most satisfactory, 

 and there never has been, m Grafton, Sutton, Millbury, or the adjoining 

 townships, anything but the pleasantest feeling toward the Hunt. 



In the autumn of 1 907, Major W. Austin Wadsworth, Master of the 

 Genesee Valley Hunt, offered to loan to Mr. Smith a portion of his country, 

 lying some fifteen miles from his kennels, and known as the " Upland 

 country," and this proposition Mr. Smith very gladly accepted, taking his 

 hounds there for the season of 1907-8, and making his headquarters at the 

 Big Tree Inn at Geneseo. The Grafton went out on alternate days with 



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