BILSDALE AND SINNINGTON. 119 



they called to have a bait and talk over the 

 events of the day. They had sundry glasses of 

 grog, and then set out on their homeward journey. 

 It was about midnight when they arrived at Clay 

 Bank, a line moonlight night, and they were 

 jogging away comfortably enough, when the 

 hounds, never probably in the best of control, got 

 on the line of a fox which had crossed the road 

 out of Hoggarth's Wood. Away they went, and 

 away after them went their masters, nothing loth. 

 They ran through Broughton plantations and 

 Busby Wood to Swainby End, and killed their 

 fox on Carlton plain between two and three 

 o'clock on Sunday morning. " You see they'd 

 had a sup o' gin, an' forgat 't day o' 't week," said 

 the narrator of the anecdote apologetically. Jolly 

 good fellows they must have been to have 

 scrambled across such a difficult country in the 

 ' wee sma' hours ayont the twal', and no doubt 

 they would have a good tale to tell when next 

 they visited Stokesley market. Foxes' brushes 

 are much valued in Bilsdale. What a value 

 would that possess that was fairly won by moon- 

 light on a Sunday morning. 



George Bell's father succeeded these two 

 worthies ; George Bell, Junior, who had been 

 huntsman for them, still continuing to carry the 

 horn. Bell made an early start as a huntsman, 

 for he was only fifteen years old when he first 

 undertook the arduous duties appertaining to the 



