THE 



NORTH STAFFORDSHIRE HOUNDS. 



CHAPTER I. 



EARLY ANNALS OF FOX-HUNTING IN NORTH STAFFORDSHIRE — 



MR. WICKSTED's MASTERSHIP HODGSON AND WICKSTED 



VERSES — WILL WELLS MR. DAVENPORt's MASTERSHIP 



— JOE MAIDEN. 



We are told, on high classical authority, that there were 

 brave men before Agamemnon, who were lost to fame for 

 want of an inspired bard to chronicle their prowess. 



In the same way, there can be little doubt that North 

 Staffordshire produced many gallant fox-hunters in the 

 prehistoric times before the days when Mr. Wicksted 

 first, and Mr. Davenport afterwards, came to the front ; 

 but, unfortunately, those early sportsmen are not only 

 unsung by the Warburtons and Whyte-Melvilles of their 

 day, but, by some unlucky fate, have also escaped the 

 notice of any known contemporary prose writer on sport, 

 so that there is only a tradition, mainly oral, that about 

 a hundred years ago, or more, the then Lord Talbot of 

 Ingestre for a few years hunted a portion of what is now 

 the North Stafford country, chiefly in the neighbourhood 

 of Sandon and Seighford ; and that, in a somewhat 

 casual and intermittent style, a portion of the same 

 country was afterwards hunted by sundry scratch packs 

 in the early part of the nineteenth century. Lord Vernon 

 appears to have succeeded Lord Talbot for some years 



B 



