MR. THOMAS HODGSON 185 



suggested that his continued engagement would involve 

 the payment of wages, and the authorities did not feel 

 themselves rich enough to become liable for so serious a 

 responsibility. 



Mr. Hodgson's advent was hailed with acclamation, 

 for his reputation in Holderness had been very great, 

 and no sooner was it known that he had consented to 

 hunt the Ouorn country than the Holderness farmers at 

 once announced their intention of presenting him with 

 a testimonial ; and in 1840 he had to journey north to 

 Driffield, where a dinner was given to him, at which 

 many members of the Holderness Hunt attended, and 

 a handsome though small service of plate was presented 

 to Mr. Hodgson, the gift having been purchased by 

 funds raised by the farmers alone. He took his Holder- 

 ness hounds to Leicestershire, where in due course they 

 gave a good deal of satisfaction. 



Between his establishment and Lord Suffield's, 

 however, there was a most extraordinary difference. 

 In Lord Suffield's time, says a writer of the period, 

 there was lavish waste in every department, infinitely 

 more attention being paid to a smart turn-out than to 

 the sport which ensued. The morning's show was bril- 

 liant, the performances afterwards were voted wretched. 

 In Mr. Hodgson's establishment, however, everything 

 was said to be business-like, without parade or nonsense, 

 giving promise, which appears to have been kept, of 

 famous runs equalling those of the olden times. 



Webb had been Mr. Hodgson's huntsman in Hol- 

 derness for at least part of the time that the latter 

 hunted the country, but learned a good deal of his 

 business under Mr. Conyers, in Essex, with whom he 

 remained thirteen years, and then went to the Pytchley 

 under Mr. Payne. He was accounted a good man in 

 Yorkshire, was a bold horseman, and the widest and 

 deepest of Holderness dykes had no terrors for him, 



