100 HUNTING TOURS. 



were aware of the importance of a pack of 

 hounds, and to the farmers, still more inter- 

 ested, it became a matter of considerable 

 anxiety what gentleman they could prevail 

 upon to take the country. Following a master 

 of hounds who had gained so much fame, and 

 who had been so exceedingly liberal in every 

 matter connected with foxhunting as the late 

 Earl Fitzhardinge, it required some resolution 

 in any one to become his successor. There 

 are few hunts more dependent on the farmers 

 for the preservation of foxes and other sub- 

 jects connected with the sport than this ; 

 there is none in which foxhunting is more 

 enthusiastically supported by that influential 

 class. They attend to the safety and rearing 

 of cubs with the greatest assiduity, and the 

 merest whisper of a suspicion, could such an 

 unhappy delusion ever enter any silly pate, 

 of enlarging a " bagman," or resorting to 

 any unsportsmanlike device, to make it appear 

 they had a legitimate fox in the covert, if 

 they had not one, would be repudiated by 

 them with the utmost indignation. 



C. F. Cregoe Colmore, Esq., a gentleman 

 of well-known repute as a sportsman, whose 

 residence at Cheltenham afforded opportuni- 



