Captain " Bay^^ Middle ton, 257 



say of himself as regards runs with hounds, " Video meliora 

 2)roboque/' but failing these, I am content '^ Deteriora 

 sequiJ' Owning a stud second to none — the result of 

 much care in selection — and of great experience, be the 

 country ever so big, or the pace ever so fast, bar the 

 usual accidents of a hunting-field, he is sure to see the 

 cream of every good thing. 



Selected to 'Head^' the Empress of Austria during 

 her six weeks' residence at Cottesbrooke, in the winter of 

 1878, no one could have performed a delicate and diflBcult 

 duty more efficiently. To ensure her Majesty ^s seeing 

 the sport without incurring unnecessary risk was a task 

 requiring decision, nerve, and experience, and in each of 

 these the '^ pilotage'^ of Captain Middleton was con- 

 spicuous. The history of England points to a day when 

 one of her most famous kings, noted for his love of the 

 chase, might have come to an untimely end by following 

 out hunting an adherent of the monarch he had supplanted. 

 One " Cherry,'^ a famous rider, a loyal adherent of the 

 exiled James II., one day when out with the stag-hounds, 

 seeing that William III. followed him wherever he went, 

 thought that by jumping down a steep bank into the 

 Thames, he might perchance break the usurper's neck or 

 drown him in the stream. The king, however, possibly 

 '^smelling a rat," turned away, and so escaped the trap 

 into which the loyal but malevolent Cherry hoped to 

 lead him. The beautiful lady who so gallantly followed 

 the English officer across the fences of Northamptonshire, 

 incurred no other dangers than those incident to every 

 hunting-field, and even escaped these, thanks to the skill 

 of her pilot, without mishap of any sort. Nor are the 

 Chase aud the Turf the only arenas upon which Captain 



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