A HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX 



As time went on the Old Berkeley were 

 obliged, Brooksby tells us, to abstain from 

 advertising their meets 



in order to avoid the pressure of a swarm of nonde- 

 scripts who, starting from every suburb in London, 

 were glad to make a meet of foxhounds their excuse 

 for a holiday on hackney or wagonette, over- 

 whelming the whole procedure by their presence 

 and irritating farmers and landowners, to the great 

 injury of the hunt. 9 



At that time there was still in the Harrow 

 district ' a small stretch of as good grass as 

 is to be ridden over in England,' but it was 

 yearly being narrowed by 'the advancing 

 waste of bricks and mortar ' and the increase 

 in the value of land arising from the spread 

 of London westward. 10 As in the case of 

 Mr. Grantley Berkeley's staghounds, these 

 conditions proved eventually fatal to the 

 continuance of the Old Berkeley Hunt under 

 its old conditions and resulted in its division 

 into the two packs which still maintain its 

 traditions in neighbouring counties. 



STAGHOUNDS 



The place of honour as regards antiquity 

 among the staghounds of Middlesex must be 

 assigned to the Lord Mayor's hounds, which 

 may be regarded as a development of the 

 ancient privileges with respect to hunting of 

 the citizens of London which were confirmed 

 by Henry I in the charter already referred 

 to. 11 



It is evident from references to ' The Com- 

 mon Hunt,' or huntsman of the corporation, 

 contained in the Liber Albus, that these 

 hounds were a recognized institution in the 

 fifteenth century, when John Courtenay was 

 elected to the post ; 12 and in later times, 

 according to tradition, its meets were fre- 

 quently held in Lincoln's Inn Fields, St. 

 James's, and Mayfair. 13 According to an 

 account given of the chief officers of the 

 City by Maitland in his History of London, 

 written in 1756, the chief business of the 

 Common Hunt 



is to take care of the Pack of Hounds belonging to 

 the Mayor and Citizens, and to attend them in 



9 Brooksby, Hunting Counties of England, 1 14, 1 15. 



10 Ibid. 115. "Ante, p. 254. 

 " Liber Albus, Bk. iv, 485. 



" Hunting (Badminton Library), 17. The pack 

 has been sometimes erroneously described as ' the 

 Common Hunt,' of which the Lord Mayor was 

 ex officio the master ; Ibid ; Lord Ribblesdale, The 

 Queen' i Hounds and Staghunting Recollections. 



Hunting when they please. This Officer's House 

 allowed him is in Finsbury Fields. He has a 

 yearly Allowance besides Perquisites. He is to 

 attend the Lord Mayor on set days. This officer 

 is Michael Lally, Esquire. 14 



It is interesting to compare this account with 

 that given by Mr. Loftie of this official in 

 1891. In describing the City banquets he 

 says : 



Behind the Lord Mayor stands the 'Common 

 Hunt,' an officer in a sporting costume with a 

 jockey cap, all that is left of the old privileges of 

 the citizens granted to them by Henry I to hunt 

 in Middlesex and Surrey and as far away as the 

 Chiltern Hills. 14 



In the reign of George I, ' riding on horse- 

 back and hunting with my Lord Mayor's 

 hounds when the Common Hunt goes out ' 

 was, according to Strype, one of the favourite 

 amusements of Londoners. At the close of 

 this reign and for some years in the succeed- 

 ing one the Common Hunt was Mr. Crutten- 

 den, appointed to the office in September 

 1723. Among those who hunted with the 

 pack was Sir Francis Child, who is described 

 by Mr. Hore in his History of the Royal Buck- 

 hounds as ' fairly rivalling ' in the hunting 

 field Alderman Humphrey Parsons, the most 

 notable of the metropolitan patrons of the 

 Royal Hunt, whose reputation as an intrepid 

 rider ' extended to every part of Europe 

 wherever hunting men might chance to 

 congregate.' 16 Sir Francis Child, as may be 

 inferred from this description, also hunted 

 sometimes with the Royal Buckhounds, and 

 during the reigns of the first two Georges the 

 Lord Mayor's hounds must have suffered in 

 popularity from the predilection shown for the 

 former by 



merchant princes of the City, the lawyers, the 

 doctors, the clergy, and the rich, though humble, 

 baj man, mounted on the now obsolete ' nag ' on 

 which he travelled on business thoughts intent 

 throughout the land. 17 



They were moreover gradually driven from 

 Middlesex by the extension of London, and 

 Epping Forest, formerly only occasionally 



14 Op. cit. 1027 ; cf. a similar account in 

 Chamberlain's Hist, and Surf, of the Cities of LonJ. 

 and Westm. (written in 1770), 440. 



u W. J. Loftie, Lend. City, 117. 



16 Op. cit. 264. Alderman Parsons was twice 

 Lord Mayor of London. 



" Hist, of the Royal Buckhounds, 264; cf. The 

 Queen's Hounds and Staghunting Recollections, 29, 

 30. 



260 



