470 APPENDIX 



'Tis a fine hunting day, 'tis as balmy as May, 

 And the hounds to the village will come. 



" I fear not," said I, anxiously watching the flakes of snow as they fell 

 on the window panes. Breakfast over, and the sky somewhat brighter, I 

 mounted my hack and soon reached the meet, admiring the fine trees in 

 the park and the architectural beauty of Haveholme Priory, the seat of the 

 Hon. M. E. G. Finch-Hatton. Before the dissolution of the monasteries, 

 this Tudor mansion was owned by the Gilbertine monks of Seperingham, 

 eventually passing into the hands of the late Earl of Winchilsea. A very 

 small sprinkling of the fair sex and the great preponderance of overcoats 

 did not tend to enliven this usually pretty meet. The great lack of pedes- 

 trians showed, without a doubt, that the day was anything but an inviting 

 one. " We can't possibly run to-day," 1 muttered between my teeth, as a 

 north-easterly wind pierced me through and through. At 11.30 we moved 

 off for Evendon Wood. "Give me a southerly wind and a cloudy sky," 

 says the sportsman, " and we shall run like smoke." But I, with chatter- 

 ing teeth, murmured, " Tcmpova muiantuv, et nos mntamuv in illis," if we run 

 on a miserably cold day like this. A chorus of holloas on the Kirby side of 

 the covert broke my soliloquy and sent the hounds pell-mell out of the 

 wood. Frank having capped them on the line, they ran over the grass 

 right merrily for Evendon village, and Reynard, after crossing the old river, 

 ran for the Sleaford canal, with the evident intention of swimming; but, 

 fearing to cross the foaming tide, swung round, running parallel with the 

 canal into the park, and, after ringing round the decoy near Cobbler's 

 Lock, was run into opposite the front entrance of the Priory. I wonder 

 what those old monks would have thought of Gillard could they have seen 

 him as he held high above his head the mangled remains of Reynard, 

 with a whoop that roused the echoes of the distant woods. 



Once more we tried Evendon Wood, and again, miyabilc dicta, a find, and 

 the hounds, with a start of everyone, past the church, direct for Kirby 

 Mount, crossing the Sleaford road. Reynard ran for shelter into the gardens 

 of Mr. Charles Sharpe, but, finding the place too hot for him, made for the 

 old place, slinking among the farm buildings, and was chopped by " Rupert " 

 as he came swinging round the corner eager for the worry. This was the 

 second fox Gillard had accounted for. 



At this juncture a great discussion arose as to the advisability of draw- 

 ing Sleaford Wood or Money's Gorse. The lot fell on the wood. Fortune 

 favours the brave, for, ere the last hound had entered the covert, a shrill 

 holloa announced the departure of a mangy dog fox (not, however, one of 

 your ringing brutes, but a regular straight-ahead fox, as the roadsters found 

 out). Crossing Leasingham Moor, with its wide drains and honeycombed 

 banks (over one of which Will got a nasty fall, and is now, I'm sorry to say, 

 laid up), we hit the Ruskington road, when two foxes were viewed, one in 

 the direction of Roxholm and the other in the direction of Haverholme. 

 However, the Roxholm fox was ours, and away we went pounding along 

 like so many locomotives. Leaving the Roxholm lordship, we crossed the 

 Dorrington road in a straight line for Blockholme Gorse, and hitting some 

 grass land — which was hailed with great joy both by second and one- 

 horse men — speedily over the park, the hounds dashed into the gardens 

 with magnificent bursts of music. Here a most unfortunate catastrophe 

 occurred. Reynard undoubtedly had jumped the wall (a very high one, 

 by the way) which bounds the gardens of the Lady Mary Hamilton, and, 

 the hounds following suit, smashed innumerable frames of glass, doing 

 upwards of one hundred pounds of damage in as many seconds to plants 



