THE NORTH DURHAM COUNTRY. 31 



The Braacftpeth coverts, owned by Lord Boyne, are beauti- 

 fully kept, and it would be difficult to find a better covert than 

 the Middles, though just lately the young plantations at 

 Weather Hill seem to be more favoured by foxes. The Middles 

 is a large plantation, and with all sorts of lying, but much of it 

 has a heather bottom, and at the moment I cannot recollect 

 having seen it drawn blank — and I must have seen it drawn 

 between fifty and a hundred times at least. It is intersected 

 by wide grass rides, and there is an earth about the centre of 

 the covert and another near the stream at the north end. For 

 cubhunting there could hardly be a better place, for foxes can 

 always be viewed as they cross the rides but it is practically 

 a sure find always, though, because it is at the head of a little 

 valley, it is seldom a first draw, and I am inclined to think 

 that hounds run into it more frequently than they draw it. I 

 have a recollection of it saving a blank day on two occasions, 

 the first being many years ago, when hounds met at Witton 

 Gilbert, and drew until four o'clock without finding. It was 

 nearly dark when they reached the Middles, but they found 

 there, and ran straight to Gladdow, half a dozen miles away, 

 and where the earths were open. Henry Haverson was then 

 huntsman, and I stayed with him an hour or two at Gladdow 

 trying to collect hounds, who were busy among several fresh 

 foxes. The second occasion was when the mange epidemic was 

 at its worst, some years ago, in a season when the 

 North Durham only killed two and a half brace of clean 

 foxes, all the others being more or less mangy. Lord Boyne 

 is a great benefactor to this side of the hunt, for he owns a 

 large tract of well-foxed and very sporting country, and 

 though he himself is Master of the adjoining South Durhaiii 

 country, and now seldom out with the North Durham, he prac- 

 tically supplies the raw material for about one day in every 

 fortnight. 



North of the Brancepeth country comes the Lanchester 

 valley, about twelve miles in length, from Durham to Iveston, 

 where lies the most northerly covert. Time was when this 

 was the best riding country in the hunt, but there are now 

 three large collieries in the valley, and though they are some 

 miles apart, they have altered the character of the hunting, 

 and whereas foxes used to run week after week from Hill Top 



