174 FOX-HUNTING IN THE SHIRES 



prevailed at their meetings. Nimrod mentions that 

 his election to the Warwickshire Hunt Club at Strat- 

 ford-on-Avon was a reason for hunting with the 

 county packs. The day of Hunt Clubs is over in 

 the Shires, though I have sometimes thought that a 

 Club might help to solve some of the difficulties of 

 subscription. Yet, since the essence of a club is 

 exclusion, its existence might, in bodies so large as 

 modern hunts, excite jealousy and ill-feeling. But 

 there is no doubt that the Atherstone Hunt Club 

 helped to give the hunt an independent existence 

 and made the members feel that, like their neighbours 

 of the Quorn and the Pytchley, they had a centre for 

 their " patriotism " to their hunt. 



The country as it now is extends from Ashby-de- 

 la-Zouche to Coventry north and south, and from 

 Lutterworth to Coleshill east and west. Part of the 

 old Staffordshire side of the country is now hunted 

 by the South Staffordshire. This is much the same 

 hunting territory as supplied Mr. Osbaldeston with 

 his extra days of sport, for, after he had hunted the 

 country for two years, the number of foxes had so 

 much increased that he was able to hunt five days a 

 week instead of three. There is one respect in which 

 the Masters of the Atherstone have been at a dis- 

 advantage. The country has never until now pos- 

 sessed a pack of hounds of its own. Each Master 

 has been obliged to purchase the pack of his prede- 

 cessor or to form a new one. It was in this way 

 that, after various changes, Lord Anson, afterwards 

 first Earl of Lichfield, began a memorable master- 

 ship in 182 1, which lasted for ten years and was most 

 successful. Nobody could have started under more 

 unfavourable circumstances. Sir Bellingham Graham 

 took his pack with him into the Quorn country. 



