154 FOX-HUNTING IN THE SHIRES 



it as Northamptonshire. But though we may amuse 

 ourselves by tracing back to early times the origins 

 of our sport, yet we must not forget that fox-hunting 

 as we know it began with Mr. Meynell. No doubt 

 the fox was hunted before that, but it was Mr. Meynell 

 who first took fox-hunting in hand and out of a 

 Squireens' exercise made of it a national sport. It 

 is not the mere fact of chasing a fox, but the way in 

 which it is done, which really makes fox-hunting 

 what it is. No doubt others had prepared the way 

 by careful breeding of hounds, and, though Mr. Meynell 

 may have improved, he could not have invented 

 the fox-hound. 



But, though the possibilities of fox-hunting were 

 first made known by Mr. Meynell, a many-sided man 

 who touched life at many points, having literary and 

 social as well as sportsmanlike tastes, the same idea 

 had occurred earlier to the first Earl Spencer. It 

 was the latter who founded the Pytchley Hunt Club, 

 with the Old Hall at Pytchley as its headquarters. 

 The rooms at the Old Hall were occupied by the 

 members of the hunt, and at the same period the white 

 collar was adopted as the distinctive hunt badge. 



As we have already seen, from the hunting man's 

 point of view the huntsman is no less important than 

 the master. Indeed, the fame of every pack has been 

 founded and established by some distinguished hunts- 

 man. What Newman was to the Belvoir, what Raven 

 was to the Quorn, that Dick Knight was to the Pytchley. 

 Knight was not merely a bold rider and a fine hunts- 

 man, but a man of character and much esteemed by 

 his master. " Come along, my lord ; the longer you 

 look, the less you will like it," was his exhortation to 

 Lord Spencer when the latter was craning at a fence. 

 We may be tolerably sure that no member of the 



