CHAPTER IV 



Heroes of the Old School. — Sir Francis Burdett at Home and in the 

 Field. — Liberty Hall. — Fishing Extraordinary. — More last words 

 about Assheton Smith. — A tremendous Bullfincher. — A new Name 

 for an Old Friend. — A short game at Follow my leader. — Why 

 don't you Holloa ? — Arbitrary Architecture. — The Rooks that 

 wouldn't quit. — A new Style of Dinner Dress. — Pride and 

 Prejudice in the Servants' Hall. — The Tedworth Crystal Palace. 



The sportsmen of my time, with whom I was more 

 intimately acquainted, were. Sir Francis Burdett, the 

 Earls of Ducie and Kintore, Assheton Smith, William 

 Codrington, and Villebois — save the first, all well-known 

 masters of fox-hounds. Of Mr. Warde I knew little 

 personally, until the last year of his sporting career, 

 although when a boy at school I had often hunted with 

 his hounds on foot as well as on horseback, our tutor 

 residing in the centre of his country. 



Sir Francis was as great an enthusiast in fox-hunting 

 as in politics ; but I am inclined to think, after his ex- 

 perience of the mutability of the Vox Populi, he would 

 have abandoned politics altogether, save from the in- 

 stigation of his political friends ; for I well recollect an 

 observation he made to me, on receiving a packet of 

 letters on this subject, when sitting with him one morning 

 in his library. " Confound these fellows ! I wish they 

 would let me alone." That his opinions underwent a 

 very great change during his latter days was well known. 



At that early period of my life, knowing little, and 

 caring less about the movements of the two different 



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