THE SHIRES. 225 



made to hunt from Melton. Non cnivis — but the proverb 

 is something musty. 



Plenty of sport is to be got both from Leicester and Lough- 

 borough, and under more moderate conditions. The latter, 

 only three miles from the kennels, is the most central point in 

 the Quorn country proper, while the former is just on the 

 border line between that and Sir B. Cunard's, and is handy too 

 for an occasional day with the Atherstone. Some five-and- 

 twenty years ago Leicester was a famous quarter for hunting 

 men, who used to gather in numbers at the Old Bell Inn. But 

 then it was a cleanly quiet little market town; now it is a great 

 manufacturing town, not very quiet, and not at all cleanly. 

 Loughborough is about three hours from St. Pancras; Leicester, 

 about two and a quarter ; Melton, about three and a half : too 

 far all of them to be reached from London on the morning of 

 hunting, unless you are prepared to leave your bed not much 

 after four o'clock ! 



But the pick of the Quorn country is certainly to be got 

 from Melton. Shoby Scholes and Lord Aylesford's are the 

 great coverts near by : the first a close-grown dell, the latter a 

 covert of gorse and broom of some twenty or thirty acres; ' rare 

 things ' had Dick Christian seen from here over to Oakham in 

 the Cottesmore country or to Belvoir. Wartnaby Stone-pits 

 is another famous place, only four miles from head-quarters. 

 There were fearful fences hereabouts in the old days : spiked 

 gates, mortised rails, and all manner of devilries. The owner 

 used to say, ' There never were but two men fit to come out 

 huntmg— Lord Alvanley, who walked 18 stone, and Quarley 

 Wilson — they were the only men that ever rode straight across 

 my farm.' Farther on is Cossington Gorse, from which if the 

 fox breaks across the old Roman road between Leicester and 

 Newark, over the Hoby and Thrussington lordships, to Shoby 

 Scholes, you will get such a gallop over such a country as you 

 will find nowhere else, men say, even in the Shires. When the 

 Quorn meet at Six Hills, about six miles from Melton, you get 

 the pick of all the best coverts : those aforesaid, Thrussington 



Q 



