158 THE BROCKLESBY HOUNDS. [1S95 



exacting country, and it was no doubt the plough at Toft 

 that saved the fox's life. The bitches had given a mar- 

 vellous exhibition of hunting, and every one of them was 

 up when Dale stopped them. Beatrice had carried her by 

 no means feather weight in grand style ; but even then 

 her labours were not over, for hounds were over twenty 

 miles from their kennels, which were not reached till nine 

 o'clock on a dark winter's night. 



Dale created a Brocklesby record by killing his one- 

 hundredth fox before Christmas Day, and this took place 

 on Christmas Eve. Hunting was entirely suspended 

 owing to frost during the first week of the New Year, and 

 it was not till March 8th that anything like a good run 

 took place. This was a fast forty-five minutes from Fenby 

 Wood, with a kill in the open at Laceby. Three days 

 later a meet at Kirmington was signalized by two excellent 

 o-allops, the one of an hour and forty minutes, and the 

 other of thirty minutes, and both foxes were killed in 

 the open. Pond Close Wood provided the first fox, and 

 Wootton Gorse the other. There was a wonderful se- 

 quence of good things about that time, for on the 11th of 

 the same month there fell to the lady pack " as good a 

 run as any one wants to see," to use the huntsman's own 

 words ; and he further remarks that " the bitches carried 

 a good head all the time and ran very stout." They began 

 badly from Chase Hill with a fox going to ground ; but on 

 going to Battery Marsh they found a brace of foxes, got 

 well away with one, and settled down to run at once. 

 Dashing away down the marshes, hounds turned up below 

 Stallingborough, and, going with a rattle past Scrubb 

 Close, crossed the railway at Little London, and reached 

 Roxton Wood after a steeplechase of thirty minutes. One 

 tour of the wood and then hounds found the o2)en again, 

 and, running hard by Keelby Grange to the mill, came 

 round by the South Wells back to Roxton Wood. One 

 more turn round the wood and away they streamed over 

 the grass to Milner's Wood, went straight through it and 

 up the Brocklesby Woods, by Cottagers' Dale to Pimlico, 



