172 THE HORSE AND HIS RIDER. 



utterly incompreliensible. In 1812 Lord Middleton gave 

 1200 guineas for the pack lie purchased. When Mr. 

 Warde gave up the Craven country Mr. Horlock paid 

 him 2000 guineas for his hounds; while Lord Suffield 

 coolly handed over to Mr. Lambton 3000 guineas for his 

 pack without seeing them. To Mr. Conyers the master 

 of the Ted worth hounds offered for ''Bashful" 100 gui- 

 neas ; and for another bitch, called " Careful," 400 guineas, 

 or 10,080 francs; a sum which, in any village in France, 

 would be considered for a peasant girl — though neither 

 bashful nor careful — a splendid marriage portion. 



Before Sir Richard's death, Lord Alford, Lord Hope- 

 toun, Lord Southampton, and, since his decease, Lord 

 Stamford, who keeps seventy horses, have come forward to 

 bestow upon the hunting counties around them the same 

 noble and munificent assistance which, on a smaller scale, 

 is as liberally given in many other localities ; and yet, 

 without one minute item, the sum total of the enjoyment, 

 the recreation, the health, the good fellowship, the hard 

 riding, the enormous sums of money distributed over the 

 United Kingdom to maintain that ancient, royal, loyal, 

 noble, and national sport which seriatim we have endea- 

 voured to describe would suddenly be annihilated, were 

 we but to lose that tiny unclean beast, that dishonest 

 little miscreant that everybody abuses — The Fox. 



