HISTORY OF THE LINLITHGOW 



an excellent opportunity of evincing the nose, 

 patience, and bottom of the hounds, and the zeal 

 and determination of the master. For the last 

 five or six miles hounds literally hunted by inches, 

 for the scent lay dead cold in some fields, and 

 difficult in others ; but eventually, after a stiff 

 and most sporting run, they pulled down their 

 fox on the banks of the dell of Muiravonside. 

 The field, which then consisted of Major Shairp, 

 Mr Forbes of Callendar, his friend Mr Gatacre, 

 Mr P. Stewart, Captain Cheyne and two strangers, 

 turned for home, resolved, as the ' Sporting Maga- 

 zine' expresses it, to "make hay while the sun 

 shines," or, in other words, to hunt with Mr Hay's 

 hounds as often as possible.^ In this run, a puppy 

 at walk, hearing the cry, joined in the chase, was 

 well with the pack during the last part of it, 

 and at the finish had the head of the fox in 

 his mouth. '^ 



When, in 1830, Mr Hay resigned his master- 

 ship, — one all too short in so far as the country 

 was concerned, — Mr W. R. Ramsay of Barnton, 

 son of Mr George Ramsay, was elected to fill 

 his place. During the two years in which 

 Mr Hay had been master, Mr Ramsay had kept 

 stag- hounds at Golfhall or at Barnton, and 

 although his doing so was not at all popular 

 and was the means of causing some friction, all 

 unpleasantness seems to have passed away before 

 he took over the control.^ He engaged as hunts- 



1 Sporting Magazine,' February 1830. 2 ibid. s ibid. 



104 



