ECHOES OF THE CHASE 61 



at Windsor with greyhounds. Similar outrages were 

 committed in different parts of the country. For ex- 

 ample, certain disorderly persons broke into Somers- 

 ham Park, where they killed the deer belonging to 

 the Earl of Suffolk. The House of Lords issued 

 an order that the sheriff of the county should arrest 

 the offenders. They ought to have been summarily 

 apprehended, and committed to prison ; but the 

 sheriff showed the white feather. He reported to the 

 peers that he sent his officers to the house at Old 

 Hurst where the delinquents were supposed to be, 

 but the representatives of the law were refused 

 admittance. ' The offenders are desperate men, and 

 cannot be apprehended without raising the power of 

 the county.' Fresh directions were therefore sought 

 as to the course to pursue. Perhaps it would be 

 wearisome to pursue the subject further. In peaceful 

 times plenty of pleasant sport was found in the great 

 parks of southern Britain. In this connection I may 

 refer to an epitaph in Hault Hucknall church, 

 near Chesterfield : ' In Memory of Robert Hackett, 

 Keeper of Hardwick Park, who departed this life 

 Deer, ye 21, Anno Dom. 1703. 



Long had he chased 



The red and fallow deer, 

 But Death's cold dart 



At last has fixed him here. ' 



