INTR OD UC TION 2 1 



further explained in this deed that Queen Mary did revoke, 

 repeal, and make void the said new office, and did confirm 

 Sir Richard Pexall and his heirs in the ancient hereditary 

 office. 



In spite of this strenuous opposition of the hereditary 

 Masters, the Privy Buckhounds were re-established under 

 Elizabeth and James, and for a time the old and the new 

 systems bitterly contended for the mastery, until in the early 

 part of the seventeenth century the hereditar}^ office became 

 practically obsolete. It was in this condition when Thomas 

 Brocas, in the year 1633, sold it to Sir Lewis Watson for 

 3,000/., with the Manor of Little Weldon, held by his 

 ancestors for three centuries. Thus ended at last the long 

 line of hereditary Masters, but not the loyalty of their race. 

 For it appears from contemporary authority that Beaurepaire, 

 their ancient seat, was one of the last houses in Hampshire 

 to hold out for Charles's hopeless cause. Surprised and 

 surrounded at length by a Roundhead force from Abingdon, 

 the Brocas troop, after throwing into their moat the last 

 pieces of plate that had not been melted down for the King, 

 cut their way through to Basing House, to reinforce their 

 neighbour, the gallant old Marquis of Winchester, in his final 

 struggle. There for a few more desperate months the de- 

 scendants of the faithful Masters of the Buckhounds fought 

 on under that Paulet motto which might well have been 

 theirs also, Aimez LoyauU. For not many families can 

 boast, as can that of Brocas, that thrice in their history, 

 once in Gascony and twice in England, their fortunes have 

 been ruined by devoted loyalty to their King. 



