The Revs. Chard, Froude and Michell 123 



he preached, as well as galloped, hard." And I am told he 

 attracted large congregations ; people came from great dis- 

 tances to see and hear the bold, fearless rider in the pulpit when 

 he pleaded with eloquence his Master's cause. 



He was rector of Cotleigh, near Honiton ; it was the home 

 of the Michells, for not only had his father but his grandfather 

 and great-grandfather reigned there before him. 



Mr. Jack Michell hunted what was known as the Cotleigh 

 and East Devon harriers, though, like many of the Devonshire 

 and west country packs, they were really dwarf foxhounds, 

 hunting fox and hare, occasionally hunting both the same day 

 v/ith equal dash and drive. They were an extraordinarily useful 

 little pack, hunting badgers, fox, and hare equally successfully. 

 Once after a clinking run they killed a dog-fox as late as June the 

 10th, in the grounds of Netherton Hall, at that time occupied 

 by Sir Edmund Prideaux. 



Another most remarkable run when Mr. Jack Michell owned 

 and hunted them : they found at Silcombe, which is near 

 Honiton, and killed their fox in the dark in a neighbouring 

 county, three miles north of Taunton — a good twenty-mile 

 point. 



The curious part of this epoch-making run was that the 

 Master had no idea they had killed until next day, when a 

 farmer who had witnessed the kill enclosed the ear of the fox, 

 the only part left when the obedient, well-trained hounds 

 responded to the horn, calling them off after darkness had set 

 in. The farmer, not knowing whose hounds they were, seeing 

 no followers, thought they belonged to Mr. Eames of another 

 Cotley, near Chard, and sent the ear to him, who of course 

 forwarded it to its rightful quarters. 



One of the peculiarities of the Michell family was that 

 neither the Rev. Jack nor his father, the Rev. William, used to 

 get off their horses from start to finish on a hunting day ; I 

 understand they made this a rule, and had I not been told 

 it by a near relative of their reverences, I should not have 

 believed it. 



The old school of bipeds was certainly more hardy and 

 enduring than most of the present generation ; the same may 

 be said of horses and hounds. Most horses in these days, if 

 asked to carry a heavy man from early morning to dewy eve 



