SHROPSHIRE SPORTSMEN 163 



related ever did greater honours to the science of 

 sporting equestrianism. To make a comparison would 

 be invidious ; they were all equally good over a country ; 

 and without occasioning the mischief which hard riders 

 are prone to do, were always in the front rank when 

 pace told in its effects. Mr. George Aston departed 

 this life, to the extreme regret of his friends, in Sep- 

 tember last. The late Mr. Thomas Baker, brother of 

 the gentleman who now hunts the Wheatland country, 

 was equally good ; and the late Mr. Edward Botterel 

 was an extraordinary powerful and daring horseman. 

 There were likewise two clergymen who did 

 much honour to the ' noble science.' Though not 

 assuming to unbecoming emulation as bruising riders, 

 their steady advocacy of fox-hunting was unremitting, 

 and the names of the Reverends William Bate of 

 Willey, and William Smith of Badger, well deserve to 

 be handed down to posterity. Mr. Smith was the pre- 

 ceptor or private tutor of the late Mr. Hugh Campbell, 

 a gentleman deservedly distinguished in Warwickshire, 

 and also of Mr. Thomas Clutton Brock, for several 

 years master of the Worcestershire hounds. 



Shropshire has also produced three very celebrated 

 huntsmen : George Carter, formerly huntsman to the 

 Duke of Grafton and now with Mr. Thomas Assheton 

 Smith, George Mountford, and Joseph Maiden. Maiden 

 was born on the Willey estate and commenced with 

 Mr. Whitmore of Apley, where, as a boy, he whipped- 

 in to a pack of harriers ; from thence he went to whip- 

 in for Mr. Hornyhold in Worcestershire, and on that 

 gentleman giving up his hounds, accompanied Kit 

 Atkinson to the Surrey Union. He was also a short 

 time with Mr. Hay in Warwickshire, and became 

 huntsman to Mr. Shaw, near Lichfield, where he met 

 with a most serious and painful accident — one which 

 would have deterred most men from following the 

 chase and which unhappily he feels the effects of to 

 this day ; but his courage is undaunted. He was in the 

 act of taking a piece of flesh from the boiler, and, 



