in 



CHAPTER VIII. 



e * If civilized people were ever to lapse into the worship of animals, 

 the cow would certainly be their chief goddess. What a fountain of 

 blessing is a cow ! She is the mother of beef, the source ot butter, 

 the original cause of cheese, to say nothing of shoe-horns, hair- 

 combs, and upper leathers. A gentle, amiable, ever-yielding creature, 

 who has no joy in her family affairs which she does not share with man. 

 We rob her of her children, that we may rob her of her milk, and we 

 only care for her that the robbery may be perpetuated. " 



Household Words. 



Eccentric Sporting Characters — Mr. Bruere's Herd — His Booth Tree — 

 John Osborne — Mr. Anthony Maynard— Killerby and Warlaby Re- 

 collections — Mr. John Jackson — Lord Feversham's Herd — "Old 

 Anna" — Mr. Samuel Wiley — Mr. Borton's Leicesters. 



YORKSHIRE is so essentially the county of 

 sportsmen, orthodox or eccentric, that it may 

 not be out of place to say a word about the latter in 

 every part of England before we deal with its Sykes, 

 its Gully, and its Tom Hodgson, &c. The records of 

 them are very slight, in fact often nothing more than 

 a mere passing mention in the Gentleman's Magazine. 

 Of Miss Ann Richards of the Ashdown Club, we 

 have spoken.* Miss Mary Breeze of Lynn had also 

 good greyhounds, and took out a shooting licence, 

 and when she died she left special Suttee sort of 

 orders, that her mare and her dogs should be shot, 

 and ail buried with her. Among eccentric-clerico 

 characters, we find Cotton, a clergyman of Kew, 

 whose snare was his dog and gun, and who had them 

 generally waiting for him at his vestry door as soon as 

 service was over. It was, we believe, said of him, that 

 he put on his surplice in order to get a better shot at 

 snipes in snow time. Robinson of Kendal had a horse, 

 but he never got on to it. In fact, he always led it on 



* "Scott and Sebright," p. 244. 



