84 STAG-HUNTING ON EXMOOR. 



when the inspection was over, " I know where I am. 

 What's going on now? Do you think there's any 

 occasion for me to stop here?" Sir John, who 

 being a Liberal was politically opposed to Mr. Bisset, 

 replied that he didn't know. " Oh," was the answer ; 

 **arej)W/5 going to stop here?" "No, I am not." 

 ** Then /shan't. I shall go to the Rag." And having 

 thus tacitly paired, to the Rag he went. 



His health, however, continued to fail, and though 

 he put in an appearance when the hounds were on the 

 Ouantocks in the spring of 1883, yet the autumn found 

 him unable to ride. Throughout the spring of 1884 

 he grew gradually worse, and on the 7th of July he 

 died at Bagborough. 



The history of his mastership shows how persever- 

 ing, self-denying, and generous a man he was ; but his 

 journal, though full of detail as regards the sport, 

 contains, characteristically enough, little about the 

 master. Once indeed, at the close of his thirteenth 

 season, after recording the general satisfaction at the 

 extraordinary sport of 1867, and allowing the praise 

 due to hounds, servants, and deer preservers, he 

 observes pertinently, " But surely this is not all. 

 There must be other causes for the general success of 

 the season. Is there no such thing as a master to 



