HIS NEW PACK OF HOUNDS. 37 



time assumed the appearance of a manufacturing town in 

 miniature, or rather of a great timber mart. Numbers were 

 employed in felling the magnificent sticks of oak and elm. 

 Here might be seen knots of sturdy labourers grubbing up 

 the stumps of trees which had stood in those forests for 

 ages ; there a busy crowd piled up or carried away the un- 

 derwood : the thick glades, which had till then never seen 

 the light of day, now resounded with the axes of the wood- 

 men and the crash of the falling timber ; while the aged 

 and decrepit might be seen bending under the loads of 

 faggots, freely given to them, to cheer hearths which had 

 till the time of Mr. Smith but scantily felt the genial warmth 

 of fire. Even in renting the rides^ the squire proved himself 

 a first-rate tenant, for both these and the adjoining fences 

 were always kept in order, while the admission of air 

 through the thick plantations tended greatly to promote the 

 growth of the timber. By these means, woods which had 

 hitherto been seldom approached by hounds, except to whip 

 oflT, cheerily re-echoed the horn of the hunter. 



The only hounds Mr. Smith had of his original pack, at 

 the time of his coming into Hants, were Bounty and Soly- 

 man ; and the pack he collected was formed of drafts from 

 at least a dozen different kennels. In the first season, 

 owing to the scarcity of foxes, and the wildness of the 

 pack, he killed only four and a half brace o± foxes. In the 

 following year he purchased Sir Bichard Sutton's famous 

 pack, and at the same time was presented by him with a 

 capital hunter, Bob Boy, which Sir Bichard paid him the 

 compliment of saying, " perhaps he might ride, but no 

 one down there could." In the squire's hands he was as 

 quiet as a lamb, and soon verified the remark which old 

 Jack Shirley (who rode him up) had made, " that he would 

 be found a bad 'un to beat." An intimate friend of Mr. 

 Smith relates that it was his good fortune to witness a 

 verification of the above remark, at Burderop Park, in 

 1827. Lord Kintore at that time hunted that country 



