146 FOX-HUNTING IN THE SHIRES 



understood that Mr. Coupland, at that time Master 

 of the Quorn, desired to reclaim the Harborough 

 country. But landowners, farmers and subscribers 

 had tasted the advantages of autonomy and were 

 in no way inclined to agree to reunion. The good 

 town of Market Harborough, which, during Mr. 

 Tailby's mastership, rivalled Melton itself, threw all 

 its influence into the scale for separation, and the 

 Billesdon is now as firmly established in the loyalty 

 of its members as any hunt in England. 



Since the days of Mr. Tailby the limits of the 

 country have been much narrowed and reduced. It 

 so happened that the beginning of Mr. Tailby's master- 

 ship coincided with the resignation by Lord Lonsdale 

 of the mastership of the Cottesmore, and Sir John 

 TroUope (1855), who had stepped into the breach 

 with a view of keeping that hunt going, was unable 

 to undertake so wide an extent of country. Mr. 

 Tailby therefore received the loan of the Leicester- 

 shire woodlands of the Cottesmore and some of the 

 choicest coverts of that hunt, having the right to 

 draw the Punch Bowl, Ranksborough and other 

 places in the old and present Cottesmore country. 

 Thus for many seasons Mr. Tailby hunted the best 

 four-day-a-week country that has ever been known. It 

 is a matter of common knowledge that he showed extra- 

 ordinary sport and the Tailby Thursdays were famous. 

 Quarters at Market Harborough went to a premium. 

 AH the hardest riding men flocked to the country. 



Such were Mr. J. H. Douglass, still the secretary 

 of the hunt and one of the best of the heavy weights, 

 the Messrs. Murrietta, whe were pioneers of polo, the 

 Goslings, who lived at Harborough, Mr. Alan Penning- 

 ton, who has for many years now hunted with the 

 Quorn, " Timber " Powell, so called from his liking 



