40 REMINISCENCES OF A HUNTSMAN 



not least, the late Lord Alvanley, also among the heavy weights, 

 would not be denied. Mr. George Hawkins, on the most extra- 

 ordinary mare to carry weight I ever saw, could always hold 

 his own. Lord Cardigan was equal to any one. Colonel 

 Greenwood, of the Life Guards, one of the finest horsemen I 

 ever saw in my life, would at any time go into any water, horse 

 and all, when the deer was in danger, and from the midst of the 

 plunging and furious pack put his whip round the deer's horns, 

 and guide him to the shore. I have seen hounds, when horse 

 and all have been swimming, mount for an instant the withers 

 as well as the croup of his horse, and in their blind eagerness, 

 midst the noise and spray, catch at his horse's mane in mistake 

 for the deer ; yet in the midst of it all, the light and steady 

 hand never checked the horse in his stroke, nor did I ever see 

 the one or the other in danger. The awkwardest accident that 

 ever befell him was when the stag and hounds were in the 

 Paddington Canal. Colonel Greenwood was desirous of heading 

 them, and, in riding under the bridge on the towing-path, the 

 horse shied at the stag, and, in an endeavour to turn round, 

 slipped his hinder -legs from under him, and fell completely 

 backwards into the water on his rider. Both disappeared for 

 an instant, and rose on different sides of the bridge, when in a 

 few moments more they were together again, and saving the 

 deer as if nothing had happened. I saw mine worthy host of an 

 inn at Twickenham, " Mr. Tapps," ride up to the hounds in a 

 flooded meadow, where they had got their deer, and, not observ- 

 ing the brook whence the flood came, take a dive into it 

 unintentionally, when the hounds absolutely seized his horse by 

 the head, as he came to the surface, and in mistake very nearly 

 drowned him. 



Sir Francis Burdett and Lord Palmerston were then of the 

 hunt ; and again Lord Clanricarde, whom nothing could beat 

 (though I remember a curious fall he got, over a low rail, in the 

 park at Cranford, on his white horse), was constantly in the 

 field. Lord Clanwilliam, Lord Kinnaird, and the late Duke of 

 St. Albans, were regularly out with me ; together with Colonel 



