Gentlemen Riders 



is quite as steep as ' The Primrose.' The Marquis always 

 stood in fifty with the Captain, one to win, and was as good as 

 a small annuity to him, as while the arrangement lasted, the 

 former had only once the pull of him. On this occasion his 

 lordship was rather wroth about his defeat, and said that he 

 was * beat by the best horse,' so Becher offered to run him 

 back again and change the horses, feeling sure that Vivian 

 would disagree with him before they had gone over four fields." 

 Other well-known horses of his were Yellow Dwarf, The Sea, 

 Sir John, Blue Skin, Hackfall, Surprise, Ballysax, Conrad, 

 Columbine, Sunshine, and Redwing ; all of them winning in 

 turn in addition to carrying the Marquis and his huntsman to 

 hounds. 



At Northampton, once, the Marquis on Yellow Dwarf, who 

 looked exactly like a dun coach horse, had gone off with one of 

 those tremendous leads he was partial to, found himself fairly 

 blocked at one of the brooks — unusually swollen on this occasion 

 — by the shoemakers, always so much in evidence there, and 

 had to pull his horse into a trot, " it being a common trick of 

 the mob," says " The Druid," " to dictate the line by the pressure 

 from without, and then always set their faces most decidedly 

 against skirting if there was a good stiff place which they 

 waited to see negotiated." 



The same writer gives the following graphic description 

 in Scott and Sebright of what was known as the ** Great 

 Leicestershire Stag Hunt," organized by the Marquis when 

 resident at Lowesby : — 



" The preparations for the meet at Twyford," says the 

 Druid, " were on a remarkable scale. The stag was trained for 

 days before in a large walled kitchen garden, and the Marquis 

 with a horn and a whip and a couple of little dogs kept him 

 in exercise for hours amongst the gooseberry bushes. The 



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