PREFACE. 



THE desire to assist, in his declining years, an old 

 servant, who for fifteen seasons worked hard in the 

 hunting field, combined with a frequently expressed wish on 

 the part of many who participated in the sport during the 

 time that John — or as he was always termed, " Jack " — 

 Bevans acted as first whipper-in to the South Durham 

 fox-hounds, that some of his quaint sayings and doings 

 should be collected as a memento of pleasant days spent by 

 them in the hunting field, prompted the writer to undertake 

 this little work, which has been carried out at spare 

 intervals, when time and circumstances permitted. Owing 

 to the pressure of other work, it has of necessity been 

 performed somewhat hurriedly, but when opportunity 

 occurred, Bevans' own account of the various incidents in 

 his career have been committed to paper exactly as he 

 narrated them ; the language made use of has, in every 

 case, been that of his own adoption, varying as it may 

 appear from time to time ; but the keener the interest he 

 took in any event during its narration, the more natural 

 became his manner of expressing himself, especially when 

 he was unable to restrain a pardonable excitement in 

 recording some unusually funny adventure in the field, or 

 occurrence which appealed to his ever predominant sense of 

 humour. 



