The Rev. Dean Hole loi 



fisherman, and took out game licences without a break for half 

 a century ; while he hunted steadily all his life until old age 

 and seventeen stone made him reluctantly give up riding. 



His early youth was spent at Caunton Manor, Newark, his 

 parents' home, and he abandoned the demure joys of a rocking- 

 horse for the fiercer delights of pony-riding at the age of four, 

 when the family coachman took this branch of his education in 

 hand. Before he was many years older the leading rein was 

 abandoned and a cob supplanted the pony. When he was 

 about ten he began writing plays, which he acted with his little 

 sister. That he had an eye for dramatic situations is clear from 

 the first act of one of these plays, which begins : Act. I. — 

 " Enter a man swimming for his life." If he had lived in the 

 days of cinema play-writing he would have had a great success ! 

 Our present-day actor-managers have their little weaknesses, 

 and it was not surprising that, being author-actor-manager, 

 Hole should write leading parts for himself in which he nearly 

 always appeared in the admiration-compelling role of a hero 

 just returning from the field of battle. Wearying of the drama, 

 he took to verse, and actually got a poem about the death of 

 William IV. accepted by the Nottingham Journal, which was 

 not bad for a ten-year-old. 



It was a toss-up whether he should go into the army — ^those 

 were the days of bought commissions, which the Duke of 

 Cambridge maintained were the backbone of the army, and 

 without which the Service would go to pieces — or whether he 

 should go to Oxford. The latter scheme was adopted, but 

 first of all he sallied out to see the world. Judging by his plays 

 he was a youth who longed for adventures ; and if this was so, 

 he was not long in finding one, for no sooner had he arrived in 

 Paris than he fell in with three most agreeable fellow-countrymen 

 whose charm of manner and dashing worldliness quite fascinated 

 the boy. Having first taken the precaution of leading him to 

 a shooting-gallery, where they impressed him with their remark- 

 able skill with pistols, they proceeded to stand him a dinner in 

 the most hospitable manner, after which they played cards 

 until he was in their debt to the tune of something like £300. 



He rose to the occasion remarkably well, considering he was 

 a mere boy and thrown entirely on his own resources for the first 

 time. He felt sure he had been cheated, and calmly announced 



