THE GOLDEN AGE 



with a great turn of speed, made him one of Goodall's special 

 favourites." ^ 



We often have evidence that Goodall's interests were not 

 confined within the walls of the kennel, for from time to 

 time he makes allusion to passing events. We see that the 

 Crimean war stirred him as it did most Englishmen at the 

 time. War is after all the first and greatest of athletic sports. 

 For this the others are but the preparation, and of it they 

 are the image. How much simpler those days were than 

 are ours may be gathered from the fact that few people 

 thought much of the justice or the wisdom of the war ; they 

 simply felt that England had been at peace a long time and 

 wanted a fight. Goodall was touched with the patriotic 

 enthusiasm of the time, and the earlier pages of his diary are 

 covered with the songs which appeared in every paper, from 

 the mighty Times down to the smallest local journal. The 

 war was brought home to the huntsman by the absence 

 from the hunting field of many familiar faces, some of which 

 were not again to be seen. But so far the glory was more 

 apparent than the danger. "Glory or Death" is the cry as war 

 begins, " Death or Glory " the motto of the regiment that had 

 seen much service in 1854. The diary of the year tells us 

 that Goodall had George Shepherd and James Cooper, of 

 whom we shall hear much more hereafter, as his whippers-in, 

 while Thomas Thurlby was stud groom at Croxton Park, 

 where Lord Forester'^s horses were kept. 



In this year Goodall began cub-hunting in August, and he 

 had a horse called The Nob, which was of a very stout sort, 

 for he had him out with hounds on August i8th, 19th, 23rd, 

 28th, and September 2nd. There was a drought in this year 

 — such as had not been known for twenty-two years, the diary 

 tells us — but the Belvoir managed to get their cub-hunting all 

 the same, with such work as gave the hounds the education 

 and conditioning which caimot be dispensed with. Luckily 

 there was some rain towards the end of September. As soon 

 as the cubbing season was over the hounds were drafted, and 

 how carefully this was done may be seen by the fact that 



^ Random Recollections of the Belvoir Hunt, p. 49. 



177 N 



