12 ECHOES OF OLD COUNTY LIFE. 



and had given out that he was daily expecting heavy- 

 remittances from London. When he found he could no 

 longer remain in the district he went home : when the 

 next morning his landlady went into his room, as he 

 had not come down at his usual time, she found him 

 dead on his bed, with an empty phial marked *' poison" 

 in his hand. Thus ended the gay, joyous life of one 

 who had been the pampered and petted child of fortune, 

 and who had done as much to establish the Rothschild 

 hounds in the Vale of Aylesbury as even the noted 

 Barons themselves. 



At the close of the year 1835 Sir Robert Peel dis- 

 solved Parliament, and the great trial of strength of 

 the parties was to be on the Speakership. The King's 

 staghounds were at Aylesbury the first week in February 

 of the next year ; Lord Chesterfield was Master of the 

 Buckhounds. I remember well that Lord Chesterfield 

 was in the chair at this dinner of the Royal Hunt Club, 

 in the great room at the White Hart at Aylesbury. 

 There was a brilliant assemblage ; amongst the party 

 were the Count D'Orsay, Lords F. and A. Fitzclarence, 

 the Marquis of Clanricarde, Sir Horace Seymour, Sir 

 Seymour Blane, Hon. A. Arundel, Mr. (afterwards Sir 

 •Geo.) Wombwell, Johnny Bushe, Col. Standen, Captain 

 Fairlic, Mr. De Burgh, the master of the rival pack of 

 staghounds which hunted the Vale on alternate days 

 with the Royal pack, the Vyses, the Harcourts, the 

 Lcarmonths, the Seymours, the Sieverights, Harry Pey- 

 ton, Shakerley, Newdegate, and many of the gayest 

 men about town, over forty in all, ardent sportsmen. 

 Betting had been the order of the day for many weeks 



