MASTERS OF THE ROYAL 

 BUCK HOUNDS. 



Once a year the general public is permitted to gaze 

 upon the Master of the Royal Hunt, as in all the 

 glory of green and gold, he heads the Royal Pro- 

 cession at Ascot races. But those who hunt with ' the 

 Queen's,' of course, have many opportunities during the 

 season of gazing upon this remarkable functionary, 

 who to the ordinary Philistine appears such an anoma- 

 lous survival of a state of society as extinct as the dodo. 

 ' The intelligent foreigner,' and for the matter of that, 

 the intelligent native as well, wonders why the Royal 

 Buckhounds should exist at all, and wonders still more 

 why the Mastership of a pack of hounds should carry 

 with it political office. It is, no doubt, but a humble 

 place in the Ministry that the Master of the Buckhounds 

 holds, but still he is, by right of his Mastership, one of 

 Her Majesty's Ministers, and he holds his post only so 

 long as his party is in power. His duties comprise the 

 control of the Royal Hunt and the charge of the Royal 

 enclosure at Ascot. It was expected when Mr Gladstone 

 came into office in 1892, that he would abolish the Buck- 

 hounds. His attention was called to the matter, and he 

 stated, through his secretary, that, as all arrangements 

 had been made, it was impossible to disestablish the 

 Royal Hunt that year, but the subject should have his 



