HISTOEY OF THE LINLITHGOW 



out pre - eminently in Mr Hope's recollection as 

 good performers in the field, and the first named, 

 which was purchased from Mr John Brady, Red- 

 barns, Armagh, in the summer of 1871, carried 

 Atkinson so well in a good run from " the Wilder- 

 ness " covert at Bellsquarry in the following Decem- 

 ber, that she shortly afterwards became the property 

 of Colonel Gillon, who, not unmindful of some 

 golden moments on her back, arranged that her 

 likeness as well as his own should appear on the 

 canvas painted by Gourlay Steel ^ some years later. 

 One other horse is perhaps worthy of mention, not 

 so much because of his good qualities as a hunter 

 as on account of his having been the subject of 

 one of the few bets which Mr Hope ever had. 

 This was Volary by brother to Bird on the Wing 

 dam by Barbatus, which as a three -year -old had 

 run at Newmarket, but while Mr Hope's property 

 usually carried a whipper-in. Possessed of a fair 

 turn of speed, he was entered in the National 

 Hunters Stakes at the Liverpool Spring Meeting 

 of 1874, and at the price of six to one was w'ell 

 backed by his owner and many of his friends, 

 among whom were several officers of the First 

 Royal Dragoons then quartered at Piershill and 

 hunting with the pack. To make a long story 

 short, the whipper-in's horse won, and over his 

 victory Mr Hope alone pocketed £600. 



It need hardly be said that when Mr Hope's 

 resignation was intimated to the Hunt committee 



^ Vide illustration, p. 208. 



244 



