The Sport of Our Jincestors 



ing was supreme, and several of his maxims are in force 

 to the present hour. He was a great advocate for not 

 hurrying hounds in their work ; and having, perhaps, un- 

 paralleled influence over his field, he was enabled to prevent 

 his brother sportsmen from pressing on the hounds when 

 in difficulties — himself being the first to keep aloof : in 

 chace, no man rode harder. 



It was in his day that the hard riding, or, we should 

 rather say, quick riding, to hounds, which has ever since 

 been practised, was first brought into vogue. The late Mr. 

 Childe, of Kinlet Hall, Shropshire — a sportsman of the 

 highest order, and a great personal friend of Mr. Meynell — 

 is said to have first set the example, and it was quickly 

 followed by the leading characters of the Quorn hunt.^ 

 This system has not only continued, but has gained ground ; 

 and the art of riding a chace may be said to have arrived at 

 a state of perfection quite unknown at any other period of 

 time. That a drawback from sport, and occasional loss of 

 foxes, are often the results of this dashing method of riding 

 to hounds, every sportsman must acknowledge ; as an old 



^ Among the foremost of these were the present Earl of Jersey, then Lord 

 Villiers ; the late Lord Forester, then Mr, Cecil Forester ; Lord Delamere, 

 then Mr. Cholmondeley ; the Honourable George Germaine ; Earl Sefton ; 

 Lord Huntingfield, then the Honourable Joshua Vanneck ; the late Lords 

 Charles Somerset, Maynard, and Craven ; Lord Lyndoch, then Colonel 

 Graham ; the late Lords Foley and Wenlock, then Sir Robert Lawley ; 

 Honourables Robert Grosvenor, Berkeley Craven, and Martin Hawke ; Sir 

 John Shelley, Sir Henry Peyton, and the late Sir Stephen Glynn ; General 

 Tarleton ; Messrs. Loraine Smith, Childe, Charles Meynell, Harvey Aston, 

 Lowth, Musters, Lambton, Bennet, Hawkes, Lockley, Thomas Assheton 

 Smith, Lindow, Jacob Wardell, cum multis cdiis. 



