364 Silk and Scarlet, 



Turning-down We believe that " Frenchmen " were 

 Foxes. f^rst imported before the Revolution by- 

 some of the noblesse who had been guests at Althorp, 

 but Dick Knight never thought much of them. In 

 the first year of his Pytchley mastership, Lord Alford 

 imported six brace of the largest Scotch ones he could 

 procure. Three brace were turned down at Cottes- 

 brook, but they were not found for two seasons, and 

 Charles Payne could never account for more than 

 three brace altogether either by brush or hearsay. 

 This was not the first time that turned-down foxes have 

 mysteriously disappeared. The last day that Sir 

 Bellingham Graham was in the Pytchley country, he 

 got thirteen foxes down from Herring's, and kept them 

 in a straw place all night. The meet was at Lamport, 

 and they drew every wood for miles round ; but to 

 the sad disappointment of an enormous field, they 

 were all blank. 



Some large Sardinian foxes were once turned 

 down at Belvoir, but they thought nothing of Black- 

 berry Hill, and did little else but prowl, wolf fashion, 

 about the houses. Sir Harry Goodricke was as un- 

 lucky with the three brace of Russian foxes which 

 were sent him from Count Matuzevich. They were 

 shaggy, rather long on the leg, and small headed, and 

 took their feed regularly all summer at John O'Gaunt's ; 

 but when the season came, they had absconded, and 

 they never could get the slightest glimpse, or trace 

 the faintest cross, of them. The Count also sent a 

 few to Mr. Greene, and one or two of them showed good 

 sport. Captain White sent a former Quorn master 

 some very good ones from Derbyshire, which he kept 

 in training, when cubs, in a barn, by the aid of a 

 terrier and a four-in-hand whip. No pupils could 

 have turned out better, two of them especially, which 

 ran the same line from Peatling Gorse, nearly to 

 Shankton Holt, where the Captain was up both times, 

 and recognised them by his private " broad arrow." 



