AND STIRLINGSHIRE HUNT 



Monitor,^ and Bracer — the hound next but one 

 behind the terrier. 



And now joy and gladness reigned throughout 

 the length and breadth of the land on the occasion 

 of the ascension to the throne of Queen Victoria. 

 Possibly Mr Ramsay may have bent before his 

 youthful sovereign whilst in London on his par- 

 liamentary duties, but it is probable that Court 

 functions were not much to his liking, and that as 

 soon as it was possible for him to leave town, he 

 might be seen hastening northwards to his quiet 

 home in Mid-Lothian, surrounded by its beautiful 

 park and tall trees, where the rooks circled and 

 cawed and the wood-pigeons softly repeated " tak' 

 two coos Davy." For at Barnton there was almost 

 everything that the heart of a sportsman could 

 desire — a pack of foxhounds whose kennel, with 

 huntsman's house adjoining, lay within a stone's 

 throw of the mansion-house; a riding-school^ in 

 which hounds and horses could be exercised in the 

 severest of weather ; race-horses with suitable ac- 

 commodation for them, hunters, hacks, coach-horses 

 and coaches, with stabling and coach-houses which 

 would almost have met the requirements of a prince. 

 Thus could Mr Ramsay with ease, as the spirit 

 moved him, hear the rattle of the splinter-bars, the 

 thunder of his thorough-breds' feet upon the turf, 

 or the cry of his own hounds. Naturally, in the 

 hunting season, the hounds would receive most 

 attention, and that they could then delight the ear 



1 Monitor, got from Mr Chalmers of Aiildbar. 



2 Vide illustration, p. 122. 



135 



