1876—77.] FROM STAPLEFOKD. 173 



That the first in the van 



"Was that old Grey man 



Who rode on the old grey mare. 



Among the others who saw the run none did so better than 

 Colonel and the Messrs. Gosling, Captain Pennington, Lord 

 Esme Gordon, Sii* Bache Cunard and a lady, Lord Grey de 

 Wilton, Mr. Julius Behrens, Christian, and Captain Tryon. 



FROM STAPLEFORD. 



It is a pleasure — a labour of love — to write about Saturday, 

 December 2. The essence of a run in a grass comitry is pace, 

 and for j)ace there must be scent, the wliich for some days 

 previous had been an unknown quantity. But on a day like 

 this hounds asked only for a fox in front of them, and pace, 

 excitement, and all the glorious attributes of a Leicestershire 

 burst came as a matter of com-se. Not with one reynard only 

 was- there a gallop, but fun and merriment with three, as I 

 will endeavom* to show. Seldom does it ha^ipen that hounds 

 can fly — with fox after fox, over meadow or over plough, never 

 flashing beyond and never having to stoop for the line — as they 

 did to-day. 



An early sunny morning in the country gave way to a black 

 dull atmosphere that must have been yellow darkness in 

 London. The air was hot and laden, but the storm clouds 

 had burst overnight, and there was nothing of threat or ill- 

 omen in the smoky duskiness of the sky. The furrows lay 

 often inches deep in water, and the road puddles kept the most 

 sociable of friends wide separate — an' they cared to come 

 respectable to the covert side. The old *' Bedehouses " of the 

 Stapleford domain were named as the meeting place, and thence 

 the hounds were soon taken into the park. As they crossed 

 the mossy and now almost splash}^ turf, their retinue found 

 additions from every side, horsemen flocking through every 

 gate, and hunying to join the already swollen throng, till the 



