THE HUNTSMAN. 4r6l 



him who hunts his own hounds ; nor can there be 

 any reason assigned why an educated gentleman 

 should not excel, in any ardent and highly scienti- 

 fic pursuit, an uneducated servant ; nevertheless, 

 we do not think that, throughout the fox-hunting 

 world in general, gentlemen-huntsmen have been 

 so popular as might have been expected ; and in 

 some countries that are hunted by subscription, an 

 exception is taken against the master of the pack 

 being the huntsman. That it is a very laborious 

 office when efficiently executed, both in the kennel 

 and the field, is well known to those who have 

 filled it ; but {labor ipse voluptas) we have seen a 

 pains-taking zeal displayed in the master which we 

 have too often seen wanting in the servant ; and 

 we could name a nobleman who used frequently to 

 tell his huntsman, when drawing for his second 

 fox, that he was " thinking more of his dinner than 

 of hunting." 



In the earliest days of English hunting, gentle- 

 men-huntsmen were in high estimation ; and a 

 reference to Doomesday-hook will show that Wale- 

 ran, huntsman to William the Conqueror, pos- 

 sessed no less than fifteen manors in Wiltshire, 

 eight in Dorsetshire, together with several in 

 Hampshire ; and his name occurs on the list of 

 tenants in capite in other counties. The same 

 venerable record of antiquity describes the exten- 

 sive possessions of other huntsmen, bearing the 

 names of Croc, Godwin, Willielmus, gentlemen of 

 consideration in those times, in which, according 

 to Froissart, the ardour of the chase was carried 

 to a pitch since unequalled by the Norman lords, 



