HAWICK TO ST. BOftWELL^S. 219 



The Duke of Hamilton was a tremendously hard 

 rider, and the groom^s horse died following him on 

 his trotting chesnut from Edinburgh to Hamilton. 

 It was bought at Longtown, and Mat Milton 

 offered his Grace one thousand guineas in vain on 

 behalf of the Prince of Wales. "I can ride a 

 thousand-guinea horse as well as his Royal High- 

 ness^^ were the proud terms of the refusal. The Earl 

 of Lauderdale, then Lord Maitland, kept harriers at 

 Dunbar, and " understood horses and hunting well.^^ 

 The late Lord Minto was also '' a good rider, and 

 all the sons more or less met with my approba- 

 tion in the field." The Hon. John Elliot kept good 

 harriers near Hawick, and was the " best judge of 

 hunting of them a\" Will, in fact, often looks back 

 lo " my three best heavy weights^^ — Elliot, Tweed- 

 dale, and Saddell. The first Lord Melville, says 

 this^ inexorable and impartial historian, '' was always 

 knocking horses up." He was a heavy weight, and 

 Lord -Advocate and Treasurer of the Navy, and an 

 earlier generation would speak with awe of the 

 waggon-loads of guineas which went to pay the 

 sailors. He got WilFs brother the cadetship, 

 and Will retains his East Lothian silver hunt buttons 

 in memioriam to this day. Lord Elphinstone of Cum- 

 bernauld was also *^ a great authority'^ ; and Major 

 Maclean of Ardgower, on his '''very grand mare," and 

 Mr. Wallace of Kelly " had nothing to beat them.^' 

 The Major gave Will five shillings to buy his first 

 pair^of spurs ; and the other, an ''^ awful Radical, but 



