170 NOTITIA VENATICA. 



we now ascended the hill, and, leaving Harlaxton Wood just upon the 

 right, went away, at great speed on the part of the hounds, to Straxton. 

 Leaving this place immediately on* the right, they crossed the earths, 

 and made a straight point down to Great Paunton town. Here they 

 crossed the highf north road, and, going by the north-end of the town, 

 went over the river and the earths by the mill ; ascended the opposite 

 hill, and going across the stone quarry, skirted Paunton Wood, as if 

 bound for Boothby ; but, turning to the right, Avent over the fine coun- 

 try to Stoke Park. They left that cover on the right, and Bassen- 

 thorpe village on the left, and, topping the hill, went aAvay for Burton 

 Slade Wood ; when — the company being now reduced to five or six per- 

 sons, the horses of the hunts-people tired and not in sight, the spirit, cxei'- 

 tion, and strength, of our extraordinary fox undiminished and unbroken, 

 and a prospect of an immediate change in these great woodlands — it 

 was deemed advisable to whip oft" the hounds at this point,]: which was 

 eftected with much difficulty by Cecil Forester, Esq., and one or two 

 others. On examining the period of dm-ation of this wonderful chase, 

 it was found to have lasted tlu-ee hours. This run is supposed by all 

 sportsmen to have been the best that can be remembered in the annals 

 of fox-hunting. Its great distinguisliing marks were, the distance of the 

 point Avhere the fox was found from the place where the hounds were 

 whipped oft' from the scent, and the still greater distance of the fur- 

 thest point in the run (Gotham) from the same place. The former is 

 not less, as the crow flies, than fourteen miles ; the latter, eighteen. 

 The other qualifications which give this nm a decided superiority over 

 all others that can be remembered, were the beauty and the novelty of 

 the country over which the fox carried us, and the extraordinary 

 and continued pace at which the hounds ran during the whole time. 

 Confident in his own strength, the fox never endeavoured to keep 

 farther away from the pack than a few minutes ; and to this, per- 

 haps, Is partly to be attributed the apparent goodness of the scent, and 

 the consequent severity of the chase. He was at no time pressed to 

 defeat, § excepting Avhen he gave up liis Gotham point ; nor did he 

 fear showing himself occasionally, as he did before we reached 

 Bottesford, and again at Long Bennington, and a third time at Sir 



" ■■■ They went through a small garden close to the village. 



' ' f Very few horsemen went forward from hence ; horses were to be seen in all 

 parts of the country in great distress, and the only gentlemen who were at the con- 

 clusion were Messrs. Forester, Berkeley Craven, and Vansittart ; and of these the 

 two latter had not been near the hounds during the severe part of the run, after the 

 fox jumped up in view between Redmile and Bottesford. 



" ^: Of twenty-one couples of hounds that were out, eighteen and a half couples 

 were either immediately with the pack at the time of stopping them, or came up with 

 the huntspeople immediately after. Among the stoutest hounds were particularly 

 distinguishable Traveller and Helen. 



" § It must be recollected that this fox was possessed of such stoutness that he 

 endured for three hours the pace which is in general supposed equal to the destruc- 

 tion of an ordinary fox in forty minutes. He had evidently a knowledge of Mr. 

 Muster's country by his running up wind to Cotham ; and when he found that it 

 was not safe to persevere longer in that line, he immediately determined upon reach- 

 ing the Great Woodlands, nearly twenty-miles distant in another direction. 



