276 THE MEYNELL HOUNDS. [1890 



line on to Dearie's farm, and the huntsman marked him to ground in a stick 

 heap. The Green Wood and Egginton coppices were blank, but they found in 

 Egginton Gorse. The fox was in no hurry to quit his quarters, and played with 

 hounds for a long time, till he eventually made up his mind to go, and went away 

 at the lower end as if he meant crossing the railway. He turned along the 

 brook side towards Etwall, and, crossing it, induced two choice spirits of opposite 

 sexes to attempt to do likewise with the hounds. It was too wide to jump, and 

 the bottom was bad — so much so that the horses floundered about, and the lady 

 came perilously near getting under lier horse, and neither of the twain gained 

 much by their bold adventure beyond a mud bath. Meanwhile the rest of tlie 

 field galloped round by the road by Etwall Station and Hilton Cottage, and 

 caught hounds in Hilton allotments. The fox was headed back by the railway, 

 and crossed the main road to the Ash, where they lost him. Sutton Gorse, 

 which seems to be shorn of its ancient glory, and Dussy Bank were drawn blank, 

 and the hounds went home, thus ending another bad Thursday. But let us take 

 courage. Prospect is better than retrospect, and without a doubt good Thursdays 

 are in store for us. 



Saturday, at Dunstall, calls for but little comment beyond the fact that there 

 were plenty of foxes, which hounds kept on finding and losing alternately. The 

 universal verdict was "a very poor day." So ends the first part of the season 

 1898. Nothing remains but to drink 



" Success to the master, bis wife, and the hounds, 

 The hidies, the sportsmen, the farmers, the rest; 

 This spot where each winter their music resounds, 



Of all hunting quarters the fairest and best. 

 Where each man is a sportsman, each horse is a crack — 

 No heel taps, man, drink to our Derbyshire pack." 



January 5th, 1899. Monday and Tuesday, on which days hounds were adver- 

 ised to come to Osmaston and Newton village respectively, were dies non. The 

 news of Mr. Clowes's death, and the consequent very proper decision that there 

 should be no hunting till after the funeral, was a sad ending to Sir Peter Walker's 

 very sporting house-party at Osmaston. But if any one has a claim on the sympathy 

 of a hunt it is a late Master, and when that Master was such a man as the late Mr. 

 Clowes the claim is doubled. For a better sportsman, a better horseman, or a better 

 man to hounds — a not very common combination — never rode over Derbyshire. 

 It was a treat to see him calmly and quietly sailing over one big place after 

 another with an air of unqualified enjoyment and a complete absence of fuss or 

 hesitation. Where hounds went there went Mr. Clowes, and it is related of him 

 that, on going into a neighbouring country in the spring, when all the gaps were 

 made up and every gate was locked, he jumped seven of those formidable obstacles 

 in succession as if it was the natural thing to do. And not only in our hunting- 

 field did he seek a bent for those sporting instincts which are inherent in every 

 Englishman. Every country, where big game existed, accessible to white men 

 heard the crack of his rifle ; and thus he, too, when he went a-sporting far a-field, 

 "asked for no meaner preserve than the primeval forest, no lower park wall than 

 the snow-peaks of the Himalaya." 



A sharp frost on Wednesday night was a bad prelude to the gala day at 

 Radburne on Thursda^^ Men said it was a record gathering, even for Radburne, 

 and of a surety there were men, women, and carriages enough ! What with the 



