^O HISTORY OF THE BR AM HAM MOOR HUNT. 



And it is to the time of Queen Anne that we must look 

 back for the origin of the Bramham Moor Hunt, and as it 

 seems fitting- to us of a later generation, it was a Lane 

 Fox who was the first to hunt over that wide and sporting- 

 district which has achieved such a high position in the 

 annals of the chase, and which is known as the Bramham 

 Moor. That Lord Bingley owned hounds and hunted the 

 fox, dragging him to his kennel in the early morning", as 

 was then imperative, and that he showed good sport to his 

 friends and neighbours, we have every reason to believe ; 

 but history, as might be expected, has little to say about his 

 doings, or the doings of any of his contemporaries in the way 

 of sport, and the silence of history is much to be regretted. 

 But though the Bramham Moor Hunt undoubtedly had 

 its origin when Anne was queen, and when Lord Bingley, 

 who was a friend and contemporary of Bolingbroke's, ruled 

 at Bramham Park, the real history of the Hunt may be 

 said to have begun when he was succeeded by his nephew, 

 Mr. James Lane Fox, one of the foremost sportsmen of his 

 time, though history records it of him that he was not a 

 'thruster.' But Mr. James Lane Fox, — 'Jemmy Fox of 

 Bramham ' as he was called by his contemporaries and 

 friends, — did not succeed as M. F. H. when he succeeded to 

 the estates of his uncle, and it was some few years before 

 he took up his abode on his Yorkshire estate. During tho.se 

 few years, .Sir Thomas Gascoigne, of Parlington, hunted the 

 country, or rather part of it, and Sir Walter Vavasour, of 

 Hazlewood, succeeded him ; but about the limits of the 

 country they hunted, or what kind o{ establishment they 

 kept up, or what sport they showed, history is provokingly 

 silent. 



.Sir Thomas Gascoigne, however, was a capital sportsman, 

 and was the first master of the country which is now- 

 hunted over by Lord Middleton, his rule over that country 



