THE LATE WILLIAM GOODALL 465 



come at a happy moment, in the turmoil of sport or strife. 

 I am one of those who believe, for instance, that the fate 

 of Major Whyte Melville and of Captain Middleton was 

 one they would have preferred for themselves. But a 

 hopeless, unlooked-for illness is welcome to none, and is 

 bitter without qualification to those who hold dear the life 

 and comradeship of the doomed one. 



Think not that Will Goodall rebelled. He was too 

 brave, too good a man for that, though even from his lips, 

 while yet he remained ruddy of face and strong of grip, 

 was forced once the sad plaint, " It's hard lines, it's hard 

 lines ! And to think of that beautiful testimonial of only 

 last year, when I was so well and strong ! " 



Singularly like his father's death (some forty years ago), 

 at the early age of forty-one, was that of o«;- Will Goodall. I 

 give you the Druid's words from '* Silk and Scarlet," and 

 you shall judge : " He was laid low at last, at daybreak on 

 the third anniversary of that very May day on which the 

 Hunt had presented him with its memorable tribute. 

 They buried him just within the churchyard gate at Knip- 

 ton, and under the shade of that bold chain of woodlands 

 in which his cheery voice had been heard, early and late, 

 for seventeen seasons. By all, from ' My kind Lord Duke,' 

 as he called him when his Grace bent over him to bid him 

 farewell, down to the humblest labourer, for whom he 

 always had some pleasant greeting or other, his memory 

 will ever be cherished. Those who knew more of his 

 inner life, or saw him on his deathbed, could trace to its 

 true source that consistently gentle firmness that made him 

 all-powerful to hold in check a crowd of horsemen ; and 

 it would be well if many who love the sport as dearly as 

 he did would ponder, now that he is gone, over the great 

 and striking lesson which his life taught and his fame 

 sealed." 



Does not most, or all, of this apply to our Will, who 

 lies now in " that nice open spot " of Brington churchyard, 

 near the kennels of Althorp and opposite the heavy wood- 

 land of Nobottle, the gloomy depths of which he had for 

 many a year brightened and enlivened ? In his case, <' My 

 kind Lord Duke " was personified by his former and ever 



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