PREDECESSORS 223 



Royal favour or party politics have called them. Upon the 

 other hand, we have at times been treated with little respect. 

 In the ' Infernal Marriage ' Pluto promises Cerberus the Buck- 

 hounds in the event of a change of the Ministry — I am 

 bound to say his antecedents qualified him to deal with 

 the Royal enclosure. It was the post Lord Marney most 

 coveted ; and I was told a story the other day which, as it is 

 wounding to my self-esteem, I shall degrade to a footnote.' 



I cannot pretend to having made any exhaustive inquiry 

 into the subject, but it has occurred to me that with the 

 exception perhaps of William III. the greatest men have not 

 been the best riders. As all Masters of the Buckhounds are 

 presumably first-rate horsemen, this may have something to 

 do with it ; we may be the victims of our aptitudes. 



A distinguished Frenchman — a lover of belles lettres and a 

 student of Napoleonics — told me the other day that Napoleon 

 rode ' affreusement mal,' and the slouching seat Meissonier 

 always gives him is doubtless historically accurate. It is 

 the seat of a round and short-legged heavy-stomached man, 

 and the artist hits off exactly the restless poise of the paunch 

 upon the pummel of the saddle. One ' Nim South ' formed 

 an equally poor opinion of the Duke of Wellington's horse- 

 mansnip, as well as of his get-up, when he saw him out with 

 Sir John Cope's hounds at Hartley Row Gate in 1831. As 

 everything about the Duke of Wellington is worth remem- 

 bering, and as he hunted regularly on the heather and 

 Hampshire side of the Queen's and Mr. Garth's country, 

 some of Mr. Nim South's appreciations may here be cited. 

 After telling the readers of the 'Sporting Magazine' how he 

 has to wait in a drizzling rain for some little time at the 



' ' Ben ' Stanley, the celebrated Whig Whip, was walking one day with Lords 

 Bessborough and Granville, both of whom had been Master of the Buckhounds. 

 A new Administration was in process of formation and one of them asked Mr. 

 Stanley what Lord So-and-So was likely to have. ' Oh, the Buckhounds, of 

 course ; the only place for a fellow like that.' 



