LENTHE. 9 



A charge of damaging game, through the use of un- 

 lawful means for protecting his property, was the cause 

 of his leaving Hanover and seeking a new home in 

 Mecklenburg. 



The Lenthe estate (Obergut) is situated on a 

 wooded ridge, the Benthe mountain, which joins on 

 to the extended Deister range. The stags and wild 

 boars, preserved for the royal chase and secure in 

 their inviolability, visited in large herds the Lenthe 

 fields with unmistakeable predilection. Although the 

 entire village exerted itself to protect the crops by a 

 nocturnal chain of guards, yet the game issuing forth 

 in masses often in a few hours annihilated hopes based 

 on the work of a whole year. In a severe winter, 

 when wood and field failed to afford the animals 

 sufficient sustenance, they frequently foraged in com- 

 plete herds in the villages themselves. One morning 

 the bailiff announced to my father that a herd of deer 

 had got within the farm- enclosure: the gate had been 



o o 



shut, and he wanted to know, what should be done with 

 the animals. My father gave orders that they should 

 be driven into a stable, and sent an express messenger 

 to the Royal Supreme Court Hunting Bureau in 

 Hanover with a notice of what had happened and 

 the inquiry, whether it pleased that the deer should 

 be sent to Hanover. That turned out however a 

 most unlucky business for him! After a very short 

 interval there appeared on the scene an imposing 

 commission of investigation, which liberated the stags, 

 and after a criminal inquiry of several days arrived 



