THE BRAiMHAM MOOR COUNTRY. 



23 



where, by the way, is some nice grass country by the side 

 of the Nidd. Beckwithshaw Bar is one of the principal 

 fixtures in the north-west portion of the country, and stout 

 foxes are those which hail from Beckwithshaw Woods. 



On the hills and the moors of the extreme west hounds 

 seldom get, and it may safely be said that they never meet 

 there. But occasionally a 'stout hill fox' will pay a visit 

 to the country where his legitimate enemies hold sway, and 

 then, if there should chance to be a scent, there is a run 

 worth talking about. Such a run was that which took 

 place on the fourteenth of March, i88r, an account of 

 which may perhaps as well be given here, as marking the 

 possibilities of the rougher portions of the country. The 

 account I give is from Tom Smith's Diary, which he has 

 kindly placed at my disposal. 



'March 14th. Met at Buttersike Bar with seventeen couple 

 'of hounds. Trotted off to AlmsclifF Whin. Found and 

 'went away pointing for the moors, but turned to the left 

 ' within a field of Riffa Wood, leaving it to his left, went 

 'up to Stainburn. Here he got headed and left the gill 

 'to his right; through the willow garth, and down to 

 ' Leathley, where he crossed the Washburn into the lake 

 'plantation. Through there and away over Farnley Park 

 'into the Otley plantation; through it and away, leaving 

 'the Workhouse on his left, and on past Weston, leaving 

 ' it on his left ; through Denton Park, and on over a fine 

 ' country over the Bow Wood Gill, when thev pulled him 

 ' down in the middle of a grass field on the Middleton 

 'estate. Time, i hour and 25 minutes; distance, gj miles, 

 'straight, 14 miles as hounds ran, — a fine run over a fine 

 ' country. The dog hounds hunted their fox remarkably 

 • well, and killed him handsomely ; Viceroy making one 

 ' good hit up the side of a ploughed field by Otlev 

 'Workhouse when the whole of the pack had overrun the 

 ' line, and Musket and Viceroy again hitting it off cleverly 

 'under a wall shortly before they ran into him.' 



