THE BUCKHOUNDS KE-ESTABLISHED AND EE-OEGANISED. 219 



Cardigan on June 28, 1712, and he held the office during the 

 remainder of Queen Anne's reign. 



Leaving these Masters for the present, let us briefly glance 

 at the expenses of the pack during this portion of Queen 

 Anne's reign. As previously stated, the Royal Hunt was 

 officially under a cloud during the interval extending from 

 the Queen's accession to the year after the death of Prince 

 George. But on June 24, 1709, the Royal Buckhounds were 

 re-established with all the surroundings incident to this old 

 and popular department of the Household. The Lord High 

 Treasurer — thorough sportsman though he was — was the 

 personification of economy in Governmental affairs. He was 

 the terror of the Civil Service. He made the clerks em- 

 ployed in that service earn their wages ; they had to attend 

 to their respective offices, and personally perform their 

 several duties ; they were not allowed to delegate their 

 labour to incompetent hacks yclept " writers " ; and, what 

 was the most important of his endeavours to reform the 

 shameful abuses then rampant, he abolished, with the Queen's 

 assent, the pernicious custom — a survival of the obsolete 

 patent privileges — by which Governmental officials enjoyed 

 the privilege of selling and transferring their situations to 

 others who were able and willing to buy them. Actuated 

 by this commendable policy of economy, Sidney Godolphin, 

 with cliaracteristic impartiality, cut down the established 

 cost of the Royal Buckhounds from 2,341/., at which it stood 

 in the preceding reign, to 1,100/. a year when the pack was 

 reinstated in June 1709, pursuant to the following Royal 

 Warrant : — 



Anne R. 



An Establishment of the yearly charge of the Office of 

 Master of our Buckhounds, which our pleasure is shall com- 

 mence from the 24th day of June 1709 and be paid during 

 our pleasure by the hands of the Treasurer of our Chamber 

 and be allowed upon his accounts to be made to us and taken 

 by our auditors of our imprests (viz). 



