30 The Hunting Countries of England, 



of Greenfield and neighbourliood, whence tliey hunt 

 over the Middle Marsh as far as the dykes will 

 allow. 



It was round and about these woods that^ towards 

 the end of last season hounds ran uninterruptedly 

 from 5.30 till 8.45 — the last hour and a half being of 

 course in complete darkness, and their followers only 

 reaching the hounds when suddenly and inexplicably 

 the music ceased. The pack were found all together 

 a field from Greenfield Wood and reached the kennels 

 at 11.30 that night. Welton Guide Post and Gunby 

 Cross Koads are for Welton Wood and the Gunby 

 coverts just above the Marsh, and for the Boothby 

 plantations on the lower ground. A strong covert at 

 Halton Holgate would utilise a very fine piece of 

 grass country now seldom ridden over; and would 

 often induce foxes to take a line under the hills to, or 

 from, Welton Wood on the one side and Keal on the 

 other. But as there is little likelihood of any man of 

 wealth coming forward to purchase the land for the 

 Hunt (which is itself by no means rich), and as no 

 one has yet discovered a substitute for gorse or black- 

 thorn that in its growth will pay its own rent, Halton 

 New Covert as yet scarcely takes rank as an imme- 

 diate probability. 



This Friday country possesses a great stock of 

 foxes in its woodlands, where the shooting interests 

 might with more reason be expected to clash with 

 those of foxhunting, but which, on the contrary, 

 put to shame certain manors in the centre of the open 

 country, whose proprietors would rather their few 

 acres of covert should hold twenty pheasants and no 



