Chapter V 



The Rev. Hugh Palisser Costobadie — What his Friends called Him — His Fine 

 Physique — Required Weight-Carriers — An Awkward Colt — An Adventurous 

 Ride — A Short Cut in a Dogcart — An Impossible Situation — How he Circum- 

 vented it — His Childhood — Harrow and College Days — He and a Friend as Use- 

 ful Boxers — " To Let, a Thrashing Machine" — Accepts the Living of Hallerton 

 —A Remarkable Record — Chaplain at Coblentz — Kindness of German Royalty 

 — Their Presents to H<m — Mr, Costobadie is Surprised at German Manners 

 — He Admired their Hardiness — A Court Scandal— What the Empress Thought 

 — The Empress Augusta's Advice — A Year's Holiday — Church Innovation — 

 Some Bad Luck — A Windfall — A Roadway Strewn with Banknotes — A Good 

 Example in Stable Management — His Kindness to the Poor — A Railway 

 Porter in Church — Rev. Henry Costobadie Hunts in Pink — His Views on 

 Divorce — The Rev. J. W. King — A Racehorse Owner — His Yorkshire 

 Trainer, John Osborne — His Reverence's Nom-de-plume and his Colours — 

 Some Anxious Moments — Sir Frederick Johnson's Bet — A Sensational St* 

 Leger — Osborne Telegraphs for Orders — None Received — Uses his Own Dis- 

 cretion — All Ends Well — A Winner of Three Classics — Has a Row with his 

 Bishop — His Letter to the Bishop of Lincoln — The Vicar Seldom on a Race- 

 course — Keen Shooting Man — His Death. 



THERE are still plenty of people alive who have hunted with 

 the Rev. Hugh Pahsser Costobadie in the Billesden 

 country, or with the Quorn and Mr. Fernie's. 

 Like so many of the sporting parsons of those days, the 

 Reverend " Costo," as his friends called him, was a splendidly - 

 made man, six feet four inches in height, and proportionately 

 powerful, which gave him an imposing appearance when sur- 

 pUced and in the pulpit, but was not an altogether unmixed 

 blessing when it came to finding mounts capable of carrying him 

 across the big pastures and stiff fences of the shires. 



Indeed, he found the problem so difficult that he character- 

 istically decided to go to the heart of the matter, and breed 

 weight-carriers for himself if he could not buy them. He was 

 about thirty when he came to this decision, and at once began 

 collecting a small stud in the paddocks around the rectory at 

 Hallerton. From some half-dozen brood-mares he sought to 

 produce his ideal hunter that should combine blood, bone, and 



