6o Two old Hurworth Huntsmen. 



In his new book, Hunting in the Olden Days, Mr. W. S. 

 Dixon tells us something of this quaint character. He says 

 (page 365) : " John Booth for many years was huntsman to 

 Squire Hill, of Thornton. He was the son of a farmer near 

 Loftus, and no doubt in his younger days was frequently seen 



with the Roxby hounds Willy Ecclefield, who was 



Booth's whipper-in, and who also acted as head groom, 

 deserves a word. He was a fine sportsman, a bold horseman, 

 and what is known in Yorkshire as *'a character." An instance 

 of his devotion to his Master and to sport is worth preserving. 

 He went one night to see Mr. Hill and said, " Do you want 

 owt i' t'morn, sir?" "No, Willy, I don't want anything 

 particularly," answered the Squire. " Whya, sir. Ah was 

 thinking of getting wed, but if you want owt we can put it off." 



A writer in Baily says of Coates : 



" He kept his own horses, and was a very good rider, but a very 

 jealous one ; although he went slow at his fences, he had an extraordinary 

 knack of stealing away, and went like oil on the ocean. He was called the 

 heaven-born huntsman. No keener man ever lived. He was very quick, 

 and used to rattle the woods of the Leven and the Tees till the foxes, 

 whose track he knew, would fly from them. I need not say he had a fine 

 eye and knowledge of the country. This pack never had better sport than 

 when he hunted them, and it was an unfortunate thing for the country 

 that he and Thomas Raper Wilkinson quarrelled and parted. Coates' 

 whip was the same Tom Hopper who turned them to old ' Matthew.' 



"The old signboard of the Hilton Inn is a curiosity, and still 

 preserved. On it is a painting of hounds running a fox in full view, and 

 the field following, with these lines below : — 



The fox he runs, the hounds him view. 

 Come, take a glass, and then pursue." 



In the August of 1837, Mr. Matthew Wilkinson died, and 

 the same writer said of him : 



