22 STAG-HUNTING RECOLLECTIONS 



CHAPTEE I 



GEORGIAN STAG-HUNTING 

 I summon up remembrance of things past 



I AM afraid that a great deal in this book has httle or nothing 

 to do with the Queen's Hounds. Often and often they have, 

 as it were, to be dragged in by the scruff of the neck. I 

 am constantly running out of my course, and at the outset I 

 must plead this as my excuse for the many liberties taken 

 with the unities of time and place in the following pages. 



History, according to the late Master of Balliol, is 

 Biography, and tested by Dr. Jowett's standard, any strictly 

 conscientious history of the Buckhounds must leave much to 

 be desired. For many long tracts of years they want the 

 breath of life. Like most institutions they are not palpable. 

 Their existence is abundantly vouched for by warrants, 

 salaries, and accounts, but this is a very sinister way of 

 reaching history. Besides, the history of the Boyal Buck- 

 hounds has been done already, and well done. In his work 

 on this subject, Mr. Hore taps and samples every available 

 source of official information. He has brought a trained 

 and patient industry to bear upon much old English and dog 

 Latin. Pipe Bolls and the penetralia of public offices have 

 been forced to yield their increase and been turned into 

 type and plain figures. But cheerfully as he threads his 

 way through this valley of dry bones and the dust of ages, 

 Mr. Hore laments over and over again the absence of authen- 

 tic records of actual hunting incidents. Where as an inves- 

 tigator he has failed, I am not likely to succeed. Thus the 



