SEASON 1887-88 213 



william were sold at Peterborough, where Mr. Baird 

 bought him, to the immense advantage of the 

 Cottesmore pack, as about half of it traces to 

 him now. His son Traitor lived to be the oldest 

 hound at Belvoir, and so his worth can be taken 

 for granted. Gillard did not go out of his usual 

 path when he used Prodigal, for he was by a 

 Grafton sire out of a FitzwiUiam bitch. The 

 Pytchley Comus of 1876 and Mr. Hammond's 

 Stormer are perhaps the only two hounds for which 

 the Belvoir huntsman might be asked for an ex- 

 planation, for in twenty years Frank Gillard only 

 used two kennels freely, namely the FitzwiUiam 

 and the Grafton. In all he did not go to more 

 than eight, and the number of visiting stallion 

 hounds were not much over a dozen. 



The work of hounds is again noted in the doings 

 of December 21st, when they ran from Sproxton 

 Heath Gorse and killed between Wymondham and 

 Woodwell Head. Gillard remarks : " I never saw 

 hounds hunt better, old Playmate and Caroline 

 distinguishing themselves frequently by picking up 

 the line on the fallows. So did Constant, Toilet, 

 Forecast, Dashwood, and his son Dominic, all good 

 hounds who helped to catch many a fox." 



Frost ushered in the new year, and a doubtful 

 day's hunting resulted at Rauceby in a partial 

 thaw and rain. The diary records "that a move 

 was made to Aswarby to see if the outlook was 

 any better there, and of course we had to call at 

 the Hall and see old Sir Thomas Whichcote, whom 

 I asked whether he considered it fit to hunt. ' If 



