32 HISTORY OF THE YORK AND AINSTY HUNT. 



in, and no regular huntsman was kept. I give the 

 information as I had it, and it is quite possible that the 

 new pack has somehow been mixed up with the City 

 Harriers, who were always wont to hunt a fox if they 

 could conveniently come across one without purposely 

 drawing a fox covert. 



But however near the way things may have been 

 done at first, it is certain that the ' rough and ready ' 

 system did not last long. Neither did the Committee, 

 for in 1821, Mr. George Treacher took hold of the pack 

 and hunted it for two seasons. On his retirement, 

 Messrs. George Lloyd and Robert Chaloner were 

 co-masters for a couple of seasons, and then Mr. George 

 Lloyd commenced a long and prosperous mastership. 

 Mr. Lloyd is said to have taken hold of the reins of 

 office in 1825, but it is probable that the more active 

 duties connected with the management devolved upon him 

 before he became nominally the master. At any rate, 

 such is the impression conveyed by an anonymous 

 writer in the Sporting Magazine of March, 1825. This 

 gentleman says : — 'The hounds that hunt in this part of 

 Yorkshire are known as the York and Ainsty hounds, 

 and are a subscription pack, under the direction chiefly 

 of Mr. Lloyd, of Acomb, a village near this city.' 

 Unfortunately, the tourist quoted has not given us any 

 history of the doings of the pack during his visit, and 

 his tour would have afforded much more entertaining 

 reading had he given us one or two of those runs in 

 the neipfhbourhood of Easingwold, where he tells us that 

 he saw the best sport, or, one of those excellent runs 

 on the Borou"hbrida-e road to which he refers, instead 

 of a whole page of reasons, which certainly do not 

 appeal to us of a later generation, why he does not do so. 

 Few of my readers will be found to agree with him that 



