BEAUFORT HUNT: PAST AND PRESENT. 45 



what pain one can go through when hounds are really running hard 

 for their fox. Anything is worth a good hunt, I think ? '' In 

 February, 1911, Mr. Nell was presented witli a silver model of his 

 favourite hound, " Treasure." Mr. T. P. King made the presentation. 

 A very fine silver cup had previously been presented to Mr. Nell by 

 45 of the farmers in the Avon Vale. 



P.S. — In January, 1914, Mr. Fullerton, sent in his resignation, 

 and Mr. W. R. Preston, of Seend Park, became Master of the Avon 

 Vale. 



Frank Henry. 



Farmers and Foxhunting. 



Dear Frank Henry, 



My recollections, all pleasant, of Wiltshire and Gloucestershire 

 farmers go back now for a good many years ; I think to the Season 

 of 1879. I have always considered that the farmers of a country 

 are half the country. I do not mean in the accepted and trite sense 

 that hunting could not go on at all, much less flourish, without the 

 support of the farming owners and occupiers of land ; but I mean 

 that it makes the whole difference to be out with a pack and in a 

 country where the farmers hunt themselves. In this respect — and 

 I am speaking from some experience — yours are second to none. 

 What is more, they set the tune, as it were, for a large zone of country. 

 Somehow or other, whether it be due to the soil, or to the climate, 

 or the forces of example, the Great Western Railway, say from 

 Slough to the Severn, serves a great extent of territory hunted, I 

 grant by different packs, but where the pleasure of sharing your fun 

 with those Mho get their living by the land is truly to be enjoyed. 

 Take Berkshire for instance. Mr. Garth's country and its farmers 

 were exposed to, and apparently welcomed, the operations of several 

 packs of hounds. It may be too much to say — though I am not so 

 sure that it is — that Badminton is the centre from which these more 

 extended influences have radiated ; but it is certainly not too much 

 to assign to the great hunting family of the Somersets and to their 

 long tradition and association with the land, those happy conditions 

 which attend upon and foster foxhunting in your parts. 



Bad times had depressed and impoverished all who got their 

 living by the land — owners and occupiers alike — when fiist I made 

 acquaintance with the Duke's country. All over England forced 

 sales of stock, arrears of rent, bankruptcies and compositions, farms 

 given up, bad to let again and ill to follow when let, bore testimony 

 to agricultural depression. But in Wiltsliiie and Gloucestershire 

 the country gentlemen stood by their tenants, and the tenant farmers 

 by their labourers, with the result that taking it all over I sliould 



