64 THE MASTER OF HOUNDS 



his purse, and popular with all classes of society. 

 Certainly he possessed a dogged determination, which 

 prevented him from understanding the meaning of the 

 word "failure." His obstinacy, if such it may be termed, 

 was the result of his faith in his own convictions. His 

 foundation of the Tedworth Hunt amongst difficulties 

 which appeared, even to his own father, to be insur- 

 mountable is an example of the successful issue of his 

 obstinacy. When once he had undertaken to do a 

 thing he never stopped working till he saw that the 

 thing was done. It was this trait in his character which 

 made the Duke of Wellington say of him that he would 

 have made the first cavalry officer in Europe. 



From Eton, Tom Smith — for so he was always called 

 till he became, on the death of his father, the Squire of 

 Tedworth — went to Christ Church, Oxford, where he 

 spent four years in playing cricket in the summer and 

 hunting with John Warde's hounds in Oxfordshire and 

 Northamptonshire during the winter. His prowess in 

 the cricket-field may be judged from the fact that he 

 was chosen to play in the first " Gentlemen v. Players " 

 match. On leaving Oxford, he was able to devote all 

 his energies to fox-hunting, though it was not till 1806 

 that he first carried the horn. It is interesting to note 

 that at this time, when he left Oxford, his walking 

 weight was lost., and his height 5ft. loin., and that at 

 his death his weight was list. lolb., though to the last 

 he was as hard as nails, as might be expected in the 

 case of a man who, for eighty-two years, lived up to the 

 motto — 



" Toil strings the nerves and purifies the blood." 



I 



