AND STIRLINGSHIEE HUNT 



While Stein on clipp'd screw, head cand tail up, away, 



The role of sledge-hammer is destined to play, 



Holding hard vainly tries to avoid the stop-gap, 



And involves both the riders in dismal mishap. 



jS'ext in buckskins comes Binning, who always pretends 



To see further through mill-stones than most of his friends ; 



And to prove it, he seldom endangers his neck, 



But trusts to M'Adam, and the chance of a check. 



Now the depth and the pace have exhausted the pith 



Of those Modern Athenians, Sprott, Kenny, and Smith, 



Of ]\Ielvill and Maxwell, Craig, Thomson and Hay, 



I^or will " Richard's himself " be again for tlie day : 



And Wood's bay, to moisten his ivhisile, I think 



Of the water of Lethe ■'• would fain have a drink. 



Still fresh, harking forward, we view the elite, 



The middling nags sobbing, the bad ones dead beat : 



And of those who have long since been brought to an end, 



Some blame the lost shoe, some shew "bellows to mend." 



Now the hounds run more mute, and more eagerly press 



Poor reynard, who, doubling, shows signs of distress, 



Eun into, in open, the varmint at last 



Yields his brush. Hark, woo-whoop ! the struggle is past.^ 



During the first few years of his mastership 

 Mr Ramsay hunted, besides the country proper, 

 part of Dumbartonshire, the western part of Mid- 

 Lothian, and the north-eastern part of Berwickshire, 

 while the Duke of Buccleuch overtook the south- 

 western part of Berwickshire, Boxburghshire, and 

 the bulk of Mid and East Lothian.^ In 1833, a 

 portion of the Lanarkshire country having been 

 lent by Lord Kelburne to Mr Bamsay,^ the latter 

 relinquished Berwickshire ^ in favour of the late 



1 Leith? 2 'Sporting Magazine,' February 1831. 



3 Ibid, October 1831. * Ibid., September 1833. 



» 'New Sporting Magazine,' March 1837 ; 'Field and Fern' (Sovxth), 

 1865, p. 159. 



121 



