1 8 STAG-HUNTING RECOLLECTIONS 



dants of the attainted knight, taught by bitter experience, 

 seem to have shunned the dangers of the Court, to have 

 studied woodcraft instead of statecraft, to have followed the 

 buckhounds instead of the ' dogs of war,' and to have 

 devoted tranquil years at Beaurepaire to the service of their 

 county, by acting, during successive generations, as members 

 of Parliament and Sheriffs for Hampshire. After keeping 

 hounds impartially for the Red and the. White Rose, the 

 elder line of the Masters comes, early in the sixteenth 

 century, to be represented by co-heiresses, Anne and Edith 

 Brocas ; and in their favour the power of transmitting the 

 Mastership through females was again expressly granted, to 

 the exclusion of their living uncles and other kinsmen of the 

 name, and in spite of the limitation of the succession to heirs 

 male made in the reign of Henry VI. No explanation of 

 this remarkable transaction is forthcoming, but significance 

 of favour in high places attaches itself to the facts that 

 Ralph Pexall, husband of Edith Brocas, was in Wolsey's 

 retinue, and that Richard Pexall was the Abbot of Leicester 

 of whom the dying Cardinal on his last journey ' craved a 

 little earth for charity.' 



It is unfortunately impossible to find evidence that either 

 Anne or Edith Brocas carried the horn or exercised in person 

 any duties of their office. They were probably wise to act 

 by deputy in the reign of that amorous sportsman Henry 

 VIII. , whose attentions in the hunting-field were apt to 

 lead to the block. But, had they lived somewhat later, 

 one cannot but think that a Mistress of the Buckhounds 

 would have been in place when Elizabeth, Henry's 



Man -minded offset rose 

 To chase the deer at five. 



In the next generation Sir Richard Pexall 's claim to the 

 Mastership was granted by Queen Mary in letters patent, and 

 the marriage of his daughter to her kinsman Bernard Brocas 



