50 HITNTING. 



thrown in when the drag had led the pack up to the covert 

 where he lay, taking liis rest after his midnight rambles, and it 

 was not till he was fairly on foot and away that the body of the 

 pack was laid on. Both hounds and horses were slow then as 

 compared with now, and the riders we may guess to have been 

 much like Squire Draper, 'avoiding what was unnecessary and 

 riding with judgment.' The whole affair was eminently sloiv no 

 doubt, according to our modern notions, but still, one fancies 

 the sport, as distinct from the riding, may not have been much 

 the worse. In the ' Sporting Magazine ' for July 1827, there is a 

 description of a pack of hounds kept by an old Essex squire who 

 at the close of last century hunted the country between Col- 

 chester and the sea on the Maldon side. The hounds were 

 known as harriers, 'because they used to hunt the hares,' but, 

 'the deep-toned blue-mottled, the dwarf fox-hound, the true- 

 bred harrier, the diminutive beagle, all joined in the cry, and 

 helped to supply the pot.' The general economy of the esta- 

 blishment was peculiar. The hounds were kept anyhow, 

 ' having a butcher for one master, a baker for another, a farmer 

 for a third, spreading pretty well through the village.' Whip- 

 pers-in seem to have been numerous, the butcher, the baker, 

 &c., each probably playing that part to his favourite hound. 

 The huntsman seems to have been of a piece with the rest, 

 and to have been at least as famous for his feats at table as in 

 the field. Yet ' he was a capital sportsman, and could almost 

 hunt a hare himself This picture might probably serve for 

 most of the provincial packs at that time hunting in England 

 whether fox or hare. 



The chase of the stag was pursued in much more orthodox 

 fashion, and with far more pomp and ceremony, both from the 

 nature of the animal and the fact of the sport being so much 

 older and more fashionable. From a very early date the royal 

 buckhounds were quartered in their present neighbourhood. 

 In Henry VIII.'s reign the kennels were in Swinley, probably 

 on the spot where the deer-paddocks now stand. There, too, 

 in the old days lived the masters of the royal pack, and kept 



