THE REV. JOHN LOVER 37 



cheery letters, and to lend him active as- 

 sistance with the hunt. He writes from 



London : — 



Feb. 28th, 1795. 



Dear Loder, — Grinder, not the Attorney but the 

 Dog, was sent to Kitt Lipscomb and ordered to be 

 left at the Star Inn, Oxford, with a Terrier, at the 

 same time. Lord Berkeley's Huntsman who lives 

 near Uxbridge, talked of near four or five & twenty 

 couple of boney young Hounds he should draft, 

 when he returned into Gloucestershire. I am glad 

 that you have weathered out a season, that seems 

 (exclusive of the general carnage, carried on by 

 European Powers) to have swept off both young and 

 old. I had hopes to have gripped you by the paw 

 at Rycot, but it has been decreed otherwise .... 

 I need not tell you that you are Lord and Master of 

 my Domains. . . . 



Poor Lady Charlotte is ill with the Influenza, but 

 getting better, both herself and Miss Bertie (whose 

 scrawl you'll naturally decipher) unite with me in 

 kind remembrances to you and Mrs. Loder and I 

 rest with unalterable attachment your ever faithful 

 and devoted friend, Abingdon. 



P.S. . . . Should you accidently come to 

 Town, after you have finished your Nymrodian 

 Campaign you will find a spare bed at my house in 

 Upper Brook Street. 



This Lord Berkeley is alluded to in the 

 " Badminton " volumes on hunting, as follows : 

 "When the last Lord Berkeley kept hounds 

 his country stretched from Bristol to Worm- 

 wood Scrubbs, a distance, that is, of some 120 

 miles." It is quite clear, however, that his 



