BREEDING OF HUNTERS. 277 



on the pride of Lutter worth. This illustrious hollow- 

 backed son of Blacklock, who was originally bought 

 for 450 guineas, after he broke down at Northamp- 

 ton, spread his name broadcast over the hunting- 

 fields of England, for about twenty seasons ; he has 

 not been dead more than five or six years, and his 

 list of mares for one season alone, when he was in 

 his prime, numbered about 120. His hunters are 

 after one type big plain browns with sour tempers, 

 and still sourer forge-hammer heads ; fine propelling 

 quarters, light and leggy at four, but "growing 

 down " after that period, improving vastly between 

 five and seven, and not in their prime till about 

 eight. Still it is said that a great many of them go 

 lame, and invariably in the same foot. If Mr. Lucas 

 had done nothing but buy Belzoni, he would have 

 richly deserved the 500-guinea testimonial he re- 

 ceived at Rugby, in 1855, from three hundred friends. 

 The Belzoni stock have always a wonderful dislike 

 to medicine, and it used to take Mr. Lucas nearly 

 three-quarters of an hour to get a ball down the old 

 horse, whose trick of always striking with his off 

 front foot on these occasions has been duly trans- 

 mitted to his children. He died about six years 

 ago, and the only relic we saw of him, after duly visit- 

 ing Wickliffe's at Lutterworth, was a pair of slippers, 

 which had been made for the groom out of his skin, 

 in honour of their eleven years' intimacy. The 

 animal which did as much, if not most, for his fame, 

 was a mare, The Gipsey, who was bought by the late 

 Hon. Augustus Villiers from Mr. Kench, of Dun- 

 church. She had been used in harness ; but under 

 his able handling, she soon became first-rate in the 

 field, and he won the Melton Steeple-chase and a 

 match against Lord Maidstoiie, in Leicestershire, as 

 well as another at Leamington, on her. From his 

 hands she passed into Earl Craven's, and often took 

 a front place in the field with his lordship's brother- 



