370 The Hunting Countries of England. 



turn, is " pleasanter tlian all/' might often be sung 

 with truth among these goodly green meadows. For 

 its coverts the Vale depends almost wholly on arti- 

 ficial g'orses, which are freely scattered, and carefully 

 tended, throughout its length. Its fences are nearly 

 all rough, ragged, hedges, with ditches always deep 

 and often perpendicularly cut — and a struggling horse 

 is as likely to follow his hindlegs as to pull them out 

 after him. In the neighbourhood of the elegantly- 

 named covert of Saighton, the hedges grow out of low 

 banks (in Cheshire termed cops) ; the fences require 

 more covering ; and it must lie between your mount 

 and yourself as to whether you get foothold for a 

 second spring, or go at them with a rush. The Gowy 

 is the terror of the Vale — a black, sedgey, sluggish 

 stream, with boggy uncertain banks, and only possible 

 to be jumped in a few favoured spots. Its bridges 

 are none too frequent ; its fords are foul and 

 treacherous ; a ducking in it is a dirty and dreadful 

 thing ; and altogether its presence is very hateful to 

 the Hunt. Yet it winds its slimy way across the 

 country from Beeston to the Mersey : and you must 

 often encounter it as best you may. 



The River Dee runs down the extreme west of the 

 Vale, and through .Eaton Park, the seat of the Duke 

 of Westminster. During the mastership of the latter, 

 then Lord Grosvenor, and about twenty years ago 

 (the 13th Light Dragoons being at that time quartered 

 at Manchester) a strong section of the field had the 

 temerity to follow hounds into the river. The Dee 

 was running a great pace, and overflowing its banks, 

 ^' as swift as a torrent, as deep as a tank ; " and most 



