A HISTORY OF DORSET 



HUNTING 



FOXHOUNDS 



Dorsetshire may boast of being one of the 

 first counties in Great Britain in which hunting 

 under regular conditions was carried on ; it is 

 indeed claimed by some that the first pack of 

 hounds, kept solely for the pursuit of the fox, 

 was kennelled within its borders at Cranborne 

 Chase. These hounds were kept by Mr. 

 Thomas Fownes, who resided at Steepleton 

 in the middle of the seventeenth century. He 

 was a pioneer in the breeding of foxhounds, 

 and his pack was supposed to have been the best 

 of that day for looks and hunting qualities. 

 They were afterwards sold to go to Yorkshire. 



Our history of old days would be incomplete 

 without a notice of the famous Peter Beckford, 

 the author of Thoughts on Hunting^ a standard 

 work even in these days. He was born in 1740, 

 and five years after his birth his father, Julines 

 Beckford, purchased the house and manor of 

 Steepleton from Thomas Fownes. Mr. Paget, 

 in his introduction to Thoughts on Huntings 

 says : — 



Peter's innate love of sport found vent at first in 

 keeping a pack of harriers, but these soon gave way 

 to foxhounds. Thomas Fownes had given the 

 neighbouring squires and yeomen a taste for fox- 

 hunting in its legitimate form, so that when Beckford 

 announced his intention of reviving the glories of the 

 Cranborne Chase hunt he was welcomed on all sides. 

 From what source or sources he procured the founda- 

 tion of his pack, it is now impossible to ascertain ; but 

 judging the man from his writing, one does not 

 deem it likely that he would spare either trouble or 

 expense in getting the best blood. We may also 

 consider it an established fact that by dint of careful 

 breeding he brought his pack to a very high state 

 of perfection ; but what was their ultimate fate I 

 have not yet been able to trace. The Cranborne 

 Chase country was not, even in Beckford's day, an 

 ideal spot for hunting, as he s.iys himself ; but being 

 then less cultivated and fenced it was probably much 

 better than as we know it now. They had, however, 



' The first edition of Thoughts on Hunting was pub- 

 lished in 1 78 1, and many editions have been published 

 since. It is a work full of information, knowledge, 

 and experience, and every novice should read it, to 

 prepare himself for the noble sport. The author is 

 buried in the church at Steepleton, and on the marble 

 slab of his vault is this simple inscription : 



P.B. 



sibi 



et 



suis 



MDCCCIX. 



A memorial tablet gives his name in full, the date of 

 his death, and this epitaph : 



'We die and are forgotten — 'tis He.aven's decree ; 

 Thus the fate of others will be the fate of me.' 



good sport and killed their foxes, so that it may be 

 presumed they enjoyed themselves, which is after all 

 the chief object for which we hunt. The country 

 which Beckford hunted was probably that which now 

 is known as the South Dorset. We know he hunted 

 beyond the Stour, as we have it on his authority, the 

 occasion being when he crossed it in a flood and lost 

 several hounds. To the north is the Blackmore 

 Vale, which is nearly as good a country as any in the 

 shires, being a wide expanse of grass, though it is 

 greatly spoilt by the majority of fences being planted 

 on banks. From the little one can gather of Beck- 

 ford's doings as set down by himself, I imagine he 

 was not a very hard rider, and the big banks of the 

 Vale may have had no great attraction for him. 



Of Peter Beckford Sir Egerton Brydges in 

 The Retrospective Review says : — 



Never had fox or hare the honour of being chased 

 to death by so accomplished a hunter ; never was a 

 huntsman's dinner graced with such urbanity and 

 wit. He would bag a fox in Greek, find a hare in 

 Latin, inspect his kennels in Italian, and direct the 

 economy of his stables in excellent French. 



To the real student of hunting he gives much 

 information and advice as welcome to-day as 

 when he wrote his letters. Of hounds he 

 says : — 



There are necessary points in the shape of a hound, 

 which ought always to be attended to by a sportsman; 

 for, if he be not of a perfect symmetry, he will neither 

 run fast, nor bear much work : he has much to 

 undergo, and should have strength proportioned to it. 

 Let his legs be straight as arrows ; his feet round, and 

 not too large ; his shoulders back ; his breast rather 

 wide than narrow ; his chest deep ; his back broad ; 

 his head small ; his neck thin ; his tail thick and 

 brushy ; if he carry it well, so much the better. 

 This last point, however trifling it may appear to 

 you, gave rise to a very odd question. A gentleman 

 (not much acquainted with hounds), as we were 

 hunting together the other day, said : ' I obser\'e, 

 Sir, that some of your dogs' tails stand up, and some 

 hang do^^•n ; pray, which do you reckon the best 

 hounds ? ' Such young hounds as .are out at the 

 elbows, and such as are weak from the knee to the 

 foot, should never be taken into the pack. 



A great excellence in a pack of hounds, is the head 

 they carry ; and that pack may be said to go the 

 fastest, that can run ten miles the soonest ; notwith- 

 standing the hounds, separately, m.iy not run so fast 

 as many others. A pack of hounds, considered in a 

 collective body, go fast, in proportion to the ex- 

 cellence of their noses and the head they carry, as 

 that traveller generally gets soonest to his journey's 

 end who stops least upon the road. Some hounds 

 that I have hunted with, would creep all through the 

 same hole, though they might have leapt the hedge, 

 and would follow one another in a string, as true as a 

 team of cart horses. I had rather see them, like the 

 horses of the sun, all abreast. 



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