Sir IRtcbarfc Button 401 



Sutton became Master of the Cottcsmore and hunted 

 that country for five seasons. Then came the climax of 

 his hunting career, the mastership of the Quorn. On 

 January I5th, 1 848, he purchased Quorn Hall from the 

 Olivers for ,12,000, and from that time till the day of 

 his death he hunted that famous country in a style 

 which had never been equalled before and has only 

 been once surpassed since. With eighty horses in his 

 stables and seventy-nine couples of hounds in his kennels 

 he was able to give six days' hunting a week ; and when 

 his son Richard took an outlying part of the country, the 

 Quorn could actually boast of having eight days' sport 

 a week. Sir Richard bore the whole cost, and spent 

 upwards of 10,000 a year on the Quorn during his 

 mastership. 



But after spending 350,000 in hunting during a 

 period of thirty-two years, Sir Richard, I think, began to 

 have suspicions that the game was no longer worth the 

 candle, and that he could get more enjoyment out of 

 shooting than out of fox-hunting, with less trouble and 

 expenditure. For never did he falter in his devotion 

 to the gun even in his most enthusiastic hunting 

 days it shared at least an equal part in his affections. 

 The writer to whom I have already referred says : 



"In those two pursuits he never had an equal ; others 

 may have ridden as well, and have been as good judges 

 of hounds Thomas Assheton Smith, for instance, but he 

 could not shoot with him ; and as regards his skill in 

 the use of the gun, we don't believe the man ever lived 

 who was a match for him. Mr. George Hanbury may, 

 perhaps, have been as good a partridge shot, but he had 



VOL. II. 5 



