86 THE BROCKLESBY HOUNDS. [1856 



the country from a distance, we thought it wisest, as a stranger on a strange horse, 

 with personally a special dislike to double fences, to pull gently, and let half a 

 dozen young fellows on half-made heavy-weight four or tive-year-olds go first. 

 The results of this prudent and unplucky step were most satisfactory ; while two 

 or three, with a skill we admired, without venturing to imitate, went the ' in and 

 out' clever, the rest, some down and some blundering well over, smashed at 

 least one rail out of every two, and let the ' stranger ' through comfortably at a 

 fair flying jump. After three or four of these tremendous fields, each about the 

 size of Mr. Mechi's farm, a shepherd riding after his flock on a pony, opened a 

 gate just as the hounds, after throwing up their heads for a minute, turned to the 

 right, and began to run back to the Wolds at a slower rate than we started, for 

 the fox was no doubt blown by the pace ; and so up what are called hills there 

 (they would scarcely be felt in Devonshire or Surrey) we followed at a hand 

 gallop right up to the plantations of Brocklesby Park, and for a good hour the 

 hounds worked him round and round the woods, while we kept as near them as 

 we could, racing along green rides, as magnificent in their broad-spread verdures 

 and over-hanging evergreen walls of holly and laurel as any Watteau ever 

 painted. At length, when every dodge had been tried. Master Reynard made a 

 bolt in despair. We raced him down a line of fields of very pretty fencing to a 

 small lake, where wild ducks squattered up, and there ran into him, after a fair, 

 though not a very fast, day's sport. A more honest-hunting, yet courageous, 

 dashing pack we never rode to. 



" The scarcity of villages, the general sparseness of the population, the few 

 roads, and these almost all turf-bordered, on a level with the fields, the great size 

 of the enclosures, the prevalence of light arable country, are the special features 

 of the Wolds. When you leave them and descend, there is a country of water- 

 drains and deep ditches that require a real water-jumper. Two points specially 

 strike a stranger, the complete hereditary air of the pack and the attendants, so 

 difierent from the piebald, new-varnished appearance of fashionable subscription 

 packs. Smith, the huntsman, is fourth in descent of a line of professional sports- 

 men ; Robinson, the head groom, has just completed his half-century of service 

 at Brocklesby ; and Barnetby, who rode Lord Yarborough's second horse, was 

 many years in the same capacity with the first Earl. But, after all, the Brocklesby 

 tenants — the Nainbys, the Brookes, the Skipworths, and other Woldsmen — 

 names ' whom to mention would take up too much room,' as the Eton Grammar 

 says — tenants who, from generation to generation, have lived, and flourished, and 

 hunted under the Pelbam family — a spirited, intelligent, hospitable race of men — 

 these alone are worth travelling from Land's End to see, to hear, to ride with, to 

 dine with ; to learn from their sayings and doings what a wise, liberal, resident 

 landlord, a lover of field sports, a promoter of improved agriculture, can do in 

 the course of generations towards ' breeding ' a first-class tenantry, and feeding 

 thousands of townsfolk from acres that a hundred years ago only fed rabbits. 

 We may call the Brocklesby kennels and the Pelham Pillar as witnesses on the 

 side of the common sense of English field sports. It was hunting that settled the 

 Pelhams in a remote country and led them to colonize a waste. 



" There is one excellent custom at the hunting dinners at Brocklesb}^ Park 

 which we may mention without being guilty of intrusion on private hospitality. 

 At a certain hour the stud groom enters and says, ' My lord, the horses are 

 bedded up ' ; then the whole party rise, and make a procession through the 

 stables, and return to cofi"ee in the drawing-room. This custom was introduced 

 by the first Lord Yarborough some half-century ago, in order to break through 

 the habit of late sittings over wine that was then too prevalent." 



