The Sun.
London, England, 1868-01-24 00:00:00

HUNTING.

We extract the following from a graphic sketch,
entitled " Broadbury Moor—The Chase," by M.
F. IL, and pnbliiphed in Baily's Magazine for the
current month :

" On—on —they clink, with a fair and holding
scent, carrying a grand head, with a noble volume
of tongue, at which the bard-riding farmers re-
joice greatly. Oh, daag it, if we be a bit behind,
us- can boo., 9einis----and that's aummat always.
Drat those hounds, that don't say nort about
it.' And honest John Barleycorn is right—a
silent brute is undeserving of the name of
foxhound. He is in perpetual mischief, requires
constant watching, and in a woodland, by getting
away single-handed with his fox, destroys the
chance of a run day after day. Hounds hang
back sluggishly, and do not press forward with a
hound a mile ahead ; they decline to hunt his foil,
and in a continuous range of large woods the very
best of whips cannot get at the persistent sinner,
for he must trust to sight and his own judgment of
the whereabouts a fox would be likely to break, in
order to stop him. The defect is about the worst
a foxhound can have ; it nullifies and renders him
improper for the chase, and only fit for a halter.
His apologist—if such incompetent there be—on
the plea of pace, may rest assured that true and per-
fect hounds, on the best scent and in extreme pace,
whimper on the line, flinging their tongues freely at
the several fences, and it. is only when the fox is sink-
ing, and with bristles up, that they run silently in
the last few moments for blood. A hound chary of
tongue may be rendered mute by injudicious treat-
ment ; and a' surplusage of whipcord, by a coarse
whipper-in at the time of entry, may dispirit a
hound, and render him anxious ever afterwards to
get away unperceived, as the French say—sans
battre tambour. Again, a hound overmatched in
pace is disposed to skirt cunningly, and avoids pro-
claiming his want of ability, Still, independent of
all plausible excuse, it must be admitted that the
vice of running mute is hereditary, and becoming
general throughout the more accredited kennels
of England. It is a fearful vice, destructive
of sport ; and the worst feature of the case is that
it is rendering that sport unpopular with its best
and truest friends, the yeomen and farmers of Eng-
land. A public writer on hunting subjects has said,
" Censure has been expressed concerning certain
fashionable picks of the day that they are deficient
of tongue. It is an assertion that I cannot re-
spond to." What position in the field, fore or
aft, could Providence have allotted that flatterer
of crude error ? Three of the grand packs of the
day, of hereditary and long-standing worth, are
running solemnly mute—with others straining back
to them, more or less in the same untoward pre-
dicament. The writer goes on to say, in describing
the middle of a run :—" At this crisis there is no
great amount of cry ; the pace will not permit it !"
Pace, extreme pace, with a burning scent, will make
hounds comparatively retentive, but that does not
prove anything bearing upon the point in question.
Take the hounds of Osbaldeston. The Furrier
lady pack were viciously silent, whereas the
Furrier dog hounds opened freely, and they
were brothers and sisters, descending from the
Monson blood famous for tongue. Was the dog
pack slow ? These hounds passed into the posses-
sion of Mr. Harvey Combe, with Will Todd, from
Badminton, as huntsman. They ran mixed, and
the bitches acquired tongue. The Furrier bitches
were afterwards crossed with fresh blood judi-
ciously selected, and produced the five couple lot,
with full and free tongue, which were bought in at
the sale at Tattersall's for 1,300 guineas. The
descendants of the Beaufort Justice, by the Nichol
Justice, by Jasper, by Egremont Justice, sent un-
entered to Badminton in 1812, were noted for voice,
and those who can remember Joiner, Jupiter,
Jericho, Jason, Jessie, Jessamine, Danger, Diligent,
and others of that race, may also recollect Will
Long's comparing them to a "ring of bells." Were
they deficient in pace ? Take the Duke of Grafton's
hounds that went to Assheton Smith with Saffron
by Belvoir Splendour, Nelson by Belvoir Rustic,
Nigel, grandson of the Berkeley Harrowgate,
with Collier and Pontiff, by the Meynell Pon-
tiff—all of them combined foot and tongue. When
Mr. Drake took the Mostyn hounds that had be-
come voiceless from the lavish use made of their
favourite Lady, he had recourse to the Ward Ber-
tram, Pilgrim, and Rascal, the Beaufort Denmark,
Warrior, and Wellington, the Belvoir Fatal and
Guider, and Sir Tatton Sykes's Wildair, by Splen-
dour, by the Hill Alfred, by Lord Middleton's Dar-
ling, straining back to the Vernon Vigilant sort of
Osbaldeston, to regain the lost voice; and truer hunt-
ers, quicker in their work, with freedom of tongue,
than the late Mr. Drake's hounds, were never pro-
duced at the covert side. Masters of hounds are
not ready to give two hundred guineas for five
silent hounds. The Herod, Hecuba, and Harrow-
gate descendants of the Berkeley, also, are notorious
for flinging their tongue well and musically. It is
clear that mute hounds are the consequence of a
want of attention in breeding, and a sacrifice made
to symmetry and pace, which is bringing discredit
on many a good kennel.

FOUR OLD LADIES.—David Garrick's widow sur-
vived that eminent tragedian 43 years, and died in 1822,
aged 99. She had before her marriage been a dancer on the
boards of Drury-lane, and was a native of Vienna. She
died in her chair, retaining her faculties to the last. Bailey
cites, too vaguely perhaps for the sceptical, the Hon. Mrs.
Watkins, of Glamorganshire, who died in 1790, aged 110.
The year before she died sho made a trip from Wales to
London to see Mrs. Siddons act. Nine visits did she make
to the theatre during her stay, retiring prudently before the
after-piece; and, besides this, she sat for her portrait, and
ascended to the " whispering gallery" at St. Paul's. She
got safe home, and London did not prove her Capua, as it
did Old Parr's. A more irrefragable case, perhaps, is that
of Mrs. Williams, of Moor-park, Herts, and Bride-head,
Dorset, who died, aged 102,in 1811, and of whom her great
grandson avers that she was couched for cataract when
81, and made a speech, upstanding, to her tenantry, when
they congratulated her on her hundredth birthday. No
attempt has been made to invalidate this communication
of her descoudant. The three old ladies above men-
tioned might object to the company into which for the
nonce we introduce them, in taking next Mrs., or, as she
was commonly called, "Lady" Lewson, au eccentric widow,
who died in London in 1809 at the age of 105. Born in
Essex-street, Strand, and married early, she was left a rich
widow at six-and-twenty. For the rest of her days her chief
companions
were an old man-servant, two dogs, and a cat.
In dress sho was fanciful and particular, adhering stead-
fastly to the fashions of her youth, when George I. was
king. But sh© was a decided foe to cleanliness. Her
rooms wore never washed, seldom swept, and to per-
sonal ablutions she was an utter stranger. " People who
washed themselves," sho said, " were always catching
cold." She used to smear her neck with hog's lard, and
to " top up," as regarded her cheeks, with rose-pink. Her
health was good to the last, and she cut two new teeth at
87. She was buried at Bunhill-fields burying-ground.—
Quarterly Review.