THE GENEROUS GRANBY 



was already preparing, and the French Revolution with all its 

 consequences was not a score of years off. War prices and 

 better roads were destined to have their effect on hunting as 

 on more important matters, but the fifty years of the marquis's 

 life saw the rise of the sport of fox-hunting. At the time of 

 his birth the fox-hound and the fox-hunt were rare, the idea of 

 the preservation of foxes had not sprung up, and consequently 

 the supply was small, but before his death the fox, at any 

 rate on large estates, had come to be respected as the object 

 of a national sport. 



Let us turn for a space, ere we pass to his successor, to 

 consider the condition of the chase in 1770, the year of Lord 

 Granby's death. Seventeen years before this, in 1753, Mr. 

 Meynell began his long career as master of fox-hounds. 

 The fact that he moved from Langton, situate in the very 

 best part of Leicestershire, according to our notions, to 

 Quorndon, in order to be near Charnwood Forest, shows that 

 his hounds and their work were the first consideration with 

 him. Yet Mr. Meynell's time was a period of transition, for 

 he began a quicker system of riding to hounds and a more 

 decided method of hunting them. Students of hunting his- 

 tory will note that hounds till then had all the glory and did 

 most of the work, the huntsman consequently being a much 

 less important person than he is now. Jack Raven, hunts- 

 man to Mr. Meynell, was one of the earliest in the " shires " 

 to gain fame, for of other celebrated packs, the Cottesmore 

 and the Belvoir, the huntsman is never so much as mentioned, 

 while the Smiths of Brocklesby owe their early fame chiefly 

 to their work in kennel. But though at first hunting was the 

 work of the hound, as it is still among the French, after Mr. 

 Meynell's time it became a partnership in which the wit of 

 man supplemented the intelligence of the hound, and then 

 foxes were galloped instead of being walked to death. This 

 system was no doubt fatal to the foxes, and necessitated the 

 assistance of the natural supply by the turning down of foxes, 

 which Addison hints at in the Spectator. 



Besides the Quorn, the Cottesmore country was being 

 hunted by Mr. Noel, the Brocklesby, and a little later the 



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