74 STAG-HUNTING RECOLLECTIONS 



letter to Sir John Halkett, to the love which casts out fear 

 and begets perfect understanding. Speaking of the wonder- 

 ful discipline of the Eoyal pack, Sir Arthur Halkett writes nie 

 from Pitfirrane, N.B. : ' When I was quartered at Hounslow in 

 1857 with the 3rd Light Dragoons, I saw an instance of this, 

 which I would not have believed possible, unless I had seen 

 it. The hounds were running up a grass lane, and got a 

 view at the stag, when Davis galloped along the hedge side 

 of the field, jumped into the lane in front of the hounds, 

 and drew his horse across the lane, holding his whip out at 

 arm's length. Although they were in full cry at the time, not 

 a single hound attempted to pass his horse — and when he 

 considered the stag had got a decent start, he lowered his 

 whip, and the pack dashed on again, on the line. It was the 

 most beautiful and perfect example of hound discipline I ever 

 saw.' He exercised his hounds all the year round, and went 

 out himself with the young hounds four times a week, and 

 with the old hounds twice a week. He took them chiefly 

 into Windsor Park till July, by which time they were broken 

 to fallow deer ; and Davis used to go off to Newmarket to 

 stay at the Palace with his brother-in-law, Edwards, the 

 King's trainer and former jockey. So far, I have not been 

 able to find out anything about his habits at Newmarket, but 

 in his later years, if his biographer is right, he can neither 

 have amused himself nor others very much at Ascot. ' He 

 spoke,' we are told, ' of the old days when royalty was regu- 

 lar in its attendance, and when the aristocracy and beauty of 

 England walked up and down the course between the races ; 

 rather of the glories of the past, Lords Jersey and Verulam, 

 the old Duke of York, of Zinganee, and the Colonel, and 

 Mr. Petre's Cadland, than of the present. Eacing had in 

 his mind become vulgarised and common,' and so on, and 

 so on. 



A friend, who has hunted with the Queen's Hounds 



