THE HISTORY OF THE BEL VOIR HUNT 



hounds ran clean away from everybody, only Mr. Drum- 

 mond, the Duke's brother-in-law, and Mr. Stringer, a farmer, 

 being able to live with them. Then again in the great run 

 from Folkingham Gorse : — 



" He ran by Threekingham to Spanby and Swaton, turned 

 to Thorpe Latimer for Car Dyke, up to which point Lord 

 Forester, Lords C. and R. Manners, Mr. Houson, Sir Thomas 

 Whichcote, and a few more were well with the hounds. The 

 dyke was a stopper, and Mr. Willerton was the only one who 

 crossed it — the others made for a place which was fordable — 

 but the hounds got far ahead, to the Helpringham drain. Mr. 

 Willerton got over this, but the hounds were out of sight. 

 The second whip followed Mr. Willerton, and with the excep- 

 tion of Goosey and Mr. Tindall, who got up the road, no one 

 saw the hounds again." ^ 



In the Sproxton Thorns run Lord Forester found himself 

 alone with the pack on his celebrated Julius Caesar mare. 

 He had viewed the fox, but the mare was beat, and it was a 

 farmer unnamed on a grey horse who got to their heads and 

 stopped them for him. Again it was a farmer, Mr. John 

 Woods, who was alone with the hounds and Lord Forester in 

 a wonderful run from the good little fifty-acre covert, Freeby 

 Wood. In 1856, coming nearer to our own time, Goodall and 

 Mr. Burbidge, of Thorpe Arnold, were left with hounds after 

 a hard run. 



The good feeling in the hunt was wonderful, and when the 

 troubles took place round Coston Gorse, all the neighbour- 

 hood shunned the culprit and with one accord sent him 

 to Coventry, not because the man in question opposed or 

 disliked fox-hunting, but because he showed his dislike in a 

 spiteful and un-English way by putting down poison in the 

 coverts. When Gillard took the horn he found the same race 

 of farmers, and, indeed, many of the old school were yet 

 living, such as Mr. Bemrose, Mr. T. Caswell, and Mr. Bur- 

 bidge, of Thorpe Arnold, after whom the well-known covert 

 was named by Lord Forester. Mr. Burbidge well deserved 

 the immortality which he has received, and which is a more 

 • Memoirs of the Belvoir Hounds^ p. 63. 

 304 



