224 HUNTING. 



lively. Mr. Coupland managed matters till the season of 

 1884-5, when Lord Manners succeeded, and so we pass from 

 the domain of history into the living present. 



Melton Mowbray is, of course, the cardinal point of this 

 famous hunting ground, though not the central one. There 

 hounds are comparatively close at hand every day in the week. 

 It rarely happens that a ride of ten miles at most will not find 

 them, and a ride to covert in Leicestershire has been declared 

 by an enthusiast to be better than a run anywhere else in the 

 world. From this little paradise, isled in a sea of grass, you get 

 the Quorn on Mondays and Fridays ; on Tuesdays, the Cottes- 

 more; on Wednesday, the Belvoir ; on Thursday comes either a 

 by-day with the Quorn or one of Sir Bache Cunard's northern 

 meets; on Saturday, the Belvoir and the Cottesmore are alter- 

 nately at your door. To take all the goods thus lavishly 

 provided a large stud is a necessity. True, as 'Brooksby' says, 

 six thoroughly well-seasoned nags, with the inevitable cast-iron 

 hack (who must both jump and gallop more than a bit) will 

 carry you through the season if you have luck, and here and there 

 a timely frost comes to help. Some men can certainly get more 

 out of one horse than many can out of two. But even the 

 cleverest and most saving rider must lose much of the fun if he 

 makes Melton his head-quarters with only six hunters in his 

 stable. The best sport in this country comes generally in the 

 afternoon, when the coffee-housers have gone home, and hounds 

 have a chance. But although you may have had no sport in 

 the morning, there has almost certainly been enough work, 

 what with trotting or galloping from one covert to another, a 

 short scurry here and another there, to take the morning steel out 

 of your horse. Then what are you to do ? go home with the 

 crowd, or stay and play second fiddle to your happier fellows 

 on their fresh horses ; or come to inevitable grief in a brave 

 attempt to show them the way on your tired one ? As to not 

 hunting every day from Melton, that never entered into any 

 human head. So, though undoubtedly Melton was made for 

 man to hunt from, it is not every man (nor horse either) was 



