94 HUNTING AND SPOBTING NOTES. 



Ludlow, wliich sounds like a good hunt. Perhaps I 

 may have yet another good woodland run to speak of ere 

 this chronicle closes. 



TWENTY-FIRST WEEK— March 16 to 21. 



The racing season has fairly opened, and soon after 

 this is in print the first great Handicap at Lincoln will 

 have been decided. 



The Grand National Steeplechase is not likely to draw 

 together such a large field as at first appeared probable, as 

 several have pegged out. The late owner of Belmont, 

 Major Meysey Thompson, has written an extraordinary 

 letter to the sporting papers, saying that he understands 

 Belmont has been pitched upon by a coterie of betting 

 men, and is not to be allowed to win. The position of the 

 horse in the market lends some colour to the assertion, and 

 truly Irishmen are capable of as great roguery as any 

 people I could name. 



Hunting seems to be coming to an end this year sooner 

 than usual. Frosty nights and bright days have almost put 

 their veto upon it, and we seem to be struggling on with 

 difficulty until the close of the montu, when, un- 

 doubtedly, the majority of the breeches and boots will go 

 into disuse for a few months. Nevertheless there has 

 been a flicker of sport since I last dropped my pen, and it 

 cannot be passed by unheedingiy. 



Hawkstone has certainly established, or rather re- 

 established, itself this season as the home of foxes, and is a 

 fixture that has invariably produced sport. Not one bad 

 day has it afforded from the opening one of the season. 

 Last Monday, the big lake dam at once became the scene 

 of activity, and a fox from there obligingly left the park, 

 near the North Lodge, and crossed into Wyrley Rough. 

 Not dwelling here, he gave his followers a taste of 

 enclosed country that brought out their jumping powder, 

 nearly to Frees Heath ; then to the right, skirting the 

 Twemlows, to Sandford Pool, where hounds checked. 

 Thatcher, however, hit him off cleverly in the big fields 

 beyond, and once more they rattled away over the Market 

 Drayton road, and down to the Losford Brook, near 

 where Sir Watkin Wynn's hounds crossed it a few weeks 



