238 STAG-HUNTING RECOLLECTIONS 



winning his money. Lord Lichfield, who was appointed 

 Master of the Buckhounds in 1830, hved at Fernhill, and, 

 as D'Orsay was a famous hkeness-catcher, he must have been 

 a very good-looking man. His tenure of office was marked 

 by all the agreeable qualities accorded him by Mr. Greville. 

 Upon the whole he comes out with flying colours from the 

 trying ordeal of a special and detailed mention in those fasci- 

 nating memoirs. ' He is a fine fellow with an excellent dis- 

 position, liberal, hospitable, frank and gay, quick and intelli- 

 gent. Without cultivation, extravagant and imprudent, yet 

 vdth considerable aptitude for business. Between spending 

 and speculating , buying property in one place, selhng in 

 another, and declining to sell in a third, he has half-ruined 

 a noble estate.' The writer of the article in 'Baily,' already 

 referred to, says that Davis thought less about the horses than 

 the hounds. Yet some letters of Davis to Lord Lichfield 

 I have seen went into great detail about the horses which 

 he himself and the men had ridden, and the way they had 

 carried them. Lord Lichfield was a great favourite at the 

 kennels, and he rode to hounds very well himself. On that 

 account Davis probably made a point when writing to him 

 of telling him a good deal about the horses. 



We now come to some of the Masters of the present 

 reign. Lord Chesterfield was Master at the time of the 

 Queen's coronation. It was a sort of Fran9ois I"' period 

 of stag-hunting. He dressed himself and mounted his men 

 and his friends sumptuously. He bought many of his horses 

 of Shirley of Twickenham, the father of the Shirley whose 

 riding Lord Cork commends in a good gallop in the Harrow 

 country, and who at that time kept the Catherine Wheel 

 at Egham. Quite a stud of Lord Chesterfield's horses were 

 kept at the same place, and sent on from there to the meets 

 for his many friends to ride. Dr. Croft writes me : ' I seem 

 to remember a little about him and his appearance, though I 



