i62 FOX-HUNTING FROM SHIRE TO SHIRE 



main road, with Waltham village on the right. 

 At that point hounds turned, giving the stragglers a 

 chance to catch their leaders, and after racing for 

 fifteen minutes threw up their heads on the out- 

 skirts of Waltham village. The flying visit of the 

 Bel voir will be remembered by the inhabitants for 

 many a year to come, charming them from their 

 doors to mingle with the galloping squadrons. 



Capell took the pack in hand, and eventually 

 marked his fox into the yard of the George and 

 Dragon Inn, where one sensitive-nosed bitch sprang 

 up on the low roof of an out-house, and the fox was 

 viewed on the topmost ridge of the inn, some thirty 

 or forty feet from the ground. 



The plan of action to dislodge the fugitive from 

 his aerial perch, was to procure a long ladder so that 

 Jack Hewitt the first whipper-in might climb after 

 him ; and the dapper scarlet coat was on the ridge 

 of the tall house in double quick time. Hundreds 

 of people assembled below, in the street and inn- 

 yard, watching the game with intense interest. So 

 did the fox ! who kept retreating and eventually 

 climbed the tallest chimney stack. At the critical 

 moment when the whipper-in was close to the fox, to 

 everyone's surprise, it suddenly vanished from view- 

 down the sooty bolt hole. 



The next move was to search the house below, 

 led by the sporting landlady. Miss Welborn, a fox- 

 hunter by instinct and birth-right, the niece of old 

 Will Goodall, the famous Belvoir huntsman of the 

 'sixties. Lady Greenall dismounted, going with the 

 search party into the house ; and the bedrooms 

 which were first tried, although full of soot, proved 

 to be blank. So a downward cast was made by 

 Ben Capell, to the parlour beneath, and there the 

 falling soot and mortar in the chimney gave a clue 



