NIM ROD'S NOR THERN TO UR. . 249 



a sportsman, whose decease took place a short time back and 

 who was brought to Melton Mowbray, by the late Lord Kennedy, 

 to ride Radical against Mr. Horatio Ross, on Clinker, in the 

 celebrated steeple-chase over Leicestershire, in 1829. Mr. Archi- 

 bald Douglas not having taken up his hunters this winter, I 

 only occasionally saw him in the field in Scotland, but I saw 

 enough of him to convince me that all I heard of him as a 

 sportsman was true. I put him quite at the top of the tree, be- 

 lieving that he knows the science of hunting as far as it can be 

 known. 



As a horseman, riding from twelve to thirteen stone, I need 

 say no more of "Archy Douglas," than to mention a few ex- 

 traordinary feats performed by him ; for from John o' Groats to 

 the Land's End, his name is up ; and, as was said of Mr. Robert 

 Canning, in the Epwell Hunt poem, 



" Let him ride what he will, either hunter, or hack, 

 He is certain to be on good terms with the pack." 



This, indeed, is the peculiar feature in his horsemanship over 

 a country ; it appears to matter little what sort of a horse he 

 rides, provided he has some "go" in him, for his hand is so 

 good, his seat so strong, his nerve so well-braced, and his 

 temper so fine, that he generally keeps them on their legs. But 

 his feats ! Why I think the two following can scarcely be beaten 

 by any man. He rode a steeple-chase with three ribs broken, 

 almost at the start ; and getting a fall into a brook, when in his 

 usual place in a run, he suffered his horse to drag him eight 

 yards under water rather than lose his hold of him, by which he 

 might have lost that place. The motto of the family very 

 ancient in Scotland is appropriate : " Who never backward 

 looks, but onward goes." 



Archy's eldest brother, the laird of Brigton, dropped into his 

 grave a few months back. I have called him a sportsman, 

 which he was, but in my opinion, as to fox-hunting, only to a 

 certain extent. In his love of it I should say he was exceeded 

 by no one ; but he never appeared to me to be quite satisfied in 

 his own mind of what hounds were doing, neither had he the 

 fine ear of " Archy." As a horseman, I was told he was first- 

 rate ; indeed, when I was in the field with him, past his sixtieth 

 year, no man need, or did, ride harder too hard, in fact, some- 

 times for the hounds, which he was rather given to press. But 

 let me remember-" de mortuis." The laird of Brigton was an 

 enthusiastic lover of fox-hunting, a jovial companion, and game 

 to the backbone. It was only a short time before I became 



