WITH LORD DRUMLANRIG'S 279 



the moor country, we shall run into him directly ! ' If 

 ever I recover my hounds and have another run, I will 

 let you know. 



Drumlanrig." 



Thornhill, Saturday, December 20, 1851." 



*' Mr. Editor, 



" I am well aware that it is not the usual 

 practice for a M.F.H. to publish himself the feats 

 performed in his own country' or by his own hounds ; 

 but I trust that in this single instance a conscientious 

 desire to do full justice to the gallant heart and to the 

 powers of endurance which on Friday last were so 

 wonderfully exhibited by our Barr Cover fox in his 

 flight into Nithsdale, may plead successfully against 

 imputation either of vanity or presumption on my part. 

 Peace be to his manes! for he lived not to tell his own 

 tale, but died on the banks of the River Nith, five 

 miles from the town of Sanquhar. Eheu quorum pars 

 non Jul! I only heard this last crowning piece of news 

 to-day, having returned into that part of the country 

 in search of two hounds who are still missing. The 

 rest, I may mention, all made their appearance at the 

 kennel between six and eleven o'clock the day after the 

 run. My first whip and I have ridden the run back- 

 wards since this morning; at least enough of the 

 ground (by the help of a road which runs for several 

 miles parallel to the line we went on Friday) to have 

 gained a perfect knowledge of the country gone over, 

 both as regards its nature and its extent. I have lived 

 in Dumfriesshire all my life, and I remember five 

 different packs of hounds here ; but I neither myself 

 ever crossed this part of the country before, nor does 

 the oldest inhabitant, as far as I can discover, recollect 

 seeing or hearing of hounds crossing it beyond the first 

 six miles of our run. 



" I believe on my word that this run can hardly be 

 paralleled. The hounds — five or six couple of them at 

 least — were settled well on their fox while he was still 

 in my view. I can swear that for the first six miles 

 they never checked for one single instant ; after that I 

 am hardly an authority ; for, getting a fall over a stone 

 wall, I lost sight of them, and never was able again to 

 recover my lost ground. Mr. Charles Hope Johnston, 

 and Joseph Graham, the first whip — who passed me 



