CHAPTER X 



MR. CLOWES 

 1863-1866 



THE successor to Lord Stamford was Mr. Clowes, 

 and at the outset one may be permitted to say that 

 never did a good sportsman have more wretched luck to 

 contend against. It may rather be taking the end of the 

 story first, but perhaps a summary of his mastership will 

 in a manner explain what follows. 



So far as horses, hounds, and foxes were concerned, 

 chance favoured him. Very few horses were killed; one 

 of them, however, was Goddard's favourite hunter, which 

 met its end in the Widmerpool country, and the other 

 two were less important animals. But the weather was 

 absolutely against Mr. Clowes from first to last. He 

 bought Lord Stamford's pack for 7*2000, collected to- 

 gether a capital stud of horses, and started with every 

 prospect of success. In his very first season, however, 

 that is to say, 1863-64, after Christmas, frost and snow 

 spoiled all the fun and neutralised all the master's exer- 

 tions ; and this bad weather lasted into March, for even 

 his last day was postponed through a heavy fall of snow. 



In the next season the exceptionally dry summer and 



autumn reduced cub-hunting almost to a farce, for the 



hounds could hunt a cub no further than they could see 



him, and when November came round the land was as 



hard as it could well be. There was not a scrap of 



scent, and then when rain did come in December, it was 



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