THE LONG MINORITY 



was that hunter. On a small farm he contrived, from time 

 to time, to bring into the field, to show off there, and to sell 

 afterwards at good prices as many good horses as ever per- 

 haps belonged to one person, for, in the course of nearly a 

 century, he had hunted with three generations. But this was 

 not all his praise. He had a natural vein of humour and 

 facetiousness, which the quaintness of a strong Yorkshire 

 dialect heightened still more ; and some greater men, who 

 were his neighbours, wished to trample him down — poor man ! 

 he sometimes put aside the effects of ill-humour by good- 

 humour of his own. But as the bards, from Menander down 

 to Oliver Goldsmith, were of opinion that a line of verse was 

 twice as long remembered as a line of prose, we have sub- 

 joined, in doggerel rhyme, a sketch of the character of 



"Matt Horsley, the old Fox-hunter. 



" Matt Horsley is gone ! a true sportsman from birth, 

 After all his long chases he's taken to earth ; 

 Full of days, full of whim, and good-humour he died, 

 The farmer's delight and the fox-hunter's pride ! 

 And tho' the small comforts of life's private hour 

 Were often encroached on by rank and by power, 

 And tho' his plain means could but poorly afford 

 To cope with the squire or contend with a lord — 

 Yet Matt the sharp arrows of malice still broke, 

 In his quaint Yorkshire way, by a good-humour'd joke. 



"Till fourscore and ten he continued life's course, 

 And for seventy long years he made part of his horse, 

 From the days of old Draper, who rose in the dark, 

 Matt hunted through life to the days of Sir Mark ; ' 

 With Hunmanby's squire '^ he was first in the throng. 

 And with hard Harry Foord^ never thought a day long. 

 If the fox would but run, every bog it was dry. 

 No leap was too large, no Wold hill was too high ; 

 Himself still in wind, tho' his steed might want breath, 

 He was then, as he's now, ever 'in at the death.' 



' Sir M. Masterman Sykes. 



* Humphrey Osbaldeston, Esq., who in his day had one of the best 

 packs of fox-hounds in England. 



^ Harry Foord, Vicar of Fox-holes on the Wold, esteemed one of the 

 best gentleman riders in England. 



77 



