THE LIBRARY 
 
 OF 
 
 THE UNIVERSITY 
 OF CALIFORNIA 
 
 PRESENTED BY 
 
 PROF. CHARLES A. KOFOID AND 
 MRS. PRUDENCE W. KOFOID 
 
THE OUT-OF-DOOR LIFE 
 
 OF THE 
 
 REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 
 
When autumn is flaunting his banner of pride 
 
 For glory that summer has fled, 
 Arrayed in the robes of his royalty, dyed 
 
 In tawny and orange and red ; 
 When the oak is yet rife with the vigour of life, 
 
 Though his acorns are dropping below, 
 Through bramble and brake shall the echoes awake, 
 
 To the ring of a clear Tally-Ho I " 
 
 WHYTE-M ELVI LLE. 
 
THE REV JOHN RUSSELL 
 
THE OUT-OF-DOOR LIFE 
 
 OF THE 
 
 REV. JOHN RUSSELL, 
 
 A MEMOIR. 
 
 BY 
 
 THE AUTHOR OF "DARTMOOR DAYS," ETC. 
 
 etrtttcw. 
 
 LONDON : 
 
 RICHARD BENTLEY & SON, NEW BURLINGTON ST. 
 lisjurs iit ^rbinarg to flu glajestg % (Qattn. 
 1883. 
 
 (All rights resen-ed.) 
 
THE 
 
 SECOND EDITION OF THIS MEMOIR 
 $& gtbicafeb 
 
 BY THE AUTHOR 
 
 TO 
 JOHN ANSTRUTHER THOMSON, ESQ., 
 
 A FRIEND LONG VALUED 
 AND A MAN AFTER RUSSELL'S OWN HEART. 
 
 November 6th, 1883. 
 
INTRODUCTION. 
 
 THE Reader will be glad to know, as the 
 Author is to state, that before a line of the 
 first edition of this Memoir was published, the 
 proof-sheets of every chapter were duly sub- 
 mitted to Mr. Russell himself, in order that any 
 statement, affecting directly or indirectly the 
 authenticity of his personal history, might be 
 corrected, refuted, or substantiated by his own 
 hand. 
 
 That advantage the present edition lacks 
 only in the final chapter ; which is now added 
 to wind up the history of his last years, and at 
 the same time to record as the Author does 
 with unspeakable regret the closing scene of 
 his prolonged and active life. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTEk I. 
 
 John Russell's Education under his Father Is sent to 
 Plympton School His First Fight with J. C. Bulteel 
 Is removed to Tiverton School Keeps Hounds 
 there, and gets into Trouble with Dr. Richards, the 
 Head Master Is admitted into Exeter College, 
 Oxford, in 1814 ..... 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 Buys his First Horse at Tiverton Fair, and sees his First 
 Stag killed with Lord Fortescue's Hounds Learns 
 to spar at Oxford, and sets-to with Denne and others 
 Wrestling Matches in Devon and Cornwall his 
 great delight . . . . . .22 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 A Day with the Heythrop and Sir Thomas Mostyn's 
 Packs Russell's Terriers Anecdotes of Tip and 
 Nelson The Process of manufacturing so-called 
 " Fox-Terriers " for the Market . . 45 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Is Ordained and Licensed to his First Curacy Keeps 
 Otter-Hounds at South Molton, and hunts with Mr. 
 Froude Anecdotes of that Gentleman and Dr. 
 Phillpotts, the late Bishop of Exeter . 72 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 The Teignbridge Cricket Club and the Party at Stover 
 Mr. George Templer and the "Let-'em-alones" 
 The " Bold Dragoon "The Rev. Henry Taylor and 
 his Horse "Nunky" . . . . loi 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 He falls in Love Rides by Night to Bath His Grotesque 
 Mount in Milsom Street Is Married, and removes 
 to Iddesleigh Keeps Foxhounds, and forms an 
 Alliance with Mr. C. A. Harris Difficulties with 
 Fox-killers . . . . . .120 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 The Artificial Fox-earth Accession of Country The 
 Bodmin Meetings Long Distances to Cover Sir 
 Tatton Sykes The Ivy-Bridge Hunt Week Rides 
 Home ....... 153 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 Has no Regular Whip His Three Horses Termination 
 of the Alliance and Contraction of his Country Mr. 
 J. Morth Woolcombe The Pencarrow Run Mrs. 
 Smith, of Porlock The Four Vixen Cubs . .185 
 
CONTENTS. xi 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Removes to Swymbridge His Kindness to the Gipsies 
 St. Hubert's Hall -The Vine Draft The Chumleigh 
 Club The Bishop of Exeter and the Charges 
 against Russell Bishop revokes the Curate's 
 License Mr. Trelawny on the Chumleigh Meetings 217 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 His Power in distinguishing Hounds after once hearing 
 their Names Parts with his Pack Starts again 
 Kennel Management Firing, etc. Four Days' 
 Work Mr. Houlditch as Whip Kindness to a 
 Curate A Scene between them at Lanacre Bridge 
 on the Moor ... . . . . 243 
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 
 The South Molton Club Stopping out the Foxes 
 "Beatrice and Barbara "Russell and Radcliffe's 
 Stories The "Little Specklety Hen "Russell's 
 Ducking in the Barle Mallard and Cat snapped 
 up by Foxes in Chase ..... 272 
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 The South Molton Meetings Limpetty, Mr. Trelawny's 
 Huntsman, rides over a Flood-Hatch on "Jack 
 Sheppard" Russell ceases to be a Master of Hounds 
 His Long Devotion to the "Antient Sport of 
 Kings "A Brief Sketch of the Staghounds A Bar- 
 rister and his Gallant Grey brought to Grief in an 
 Exmoor Bog Anecdote of Hind and Calf . . 301 
 
xii CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Russell and his Friend, the Rev. A. F. Luttrell, of 
 Quantockshead Danger of Handling a Stag at Bay 
 Man and Hound Injured, and both Saved by 
 Russell Ladies to the Front over Exmoor Mrs. 
 Cholmondeley's Perilous Fall . . . .333 
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 Visits Marham Hall and Sandringham Dances the Old 
 Year out and the New Year in with the Princess of 
 Wales Manly Traits in the Young Princes Sorrow 
 at Home His Clerical Life Tiverton Old Boys' 
 Meetings ...... 355 
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 
 Russell Removes to Black Torrington A Disastrous 
 Fire in his New Stables Hunts with the Quorn, 
 the Cottesmore, the Belvoir, and the Beaufort 
 Hounds Visits Col. J. Anstruther Thomson, and 
 goes with him and Mr. J. Whyte-Melville to Ascot 
 Hunts with the Staghounds, and again Visits 
 Sandringham His Last Illness Death and Funeral 387 
 
MEMOIR OF 
 THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 John Russell's Education under his Father Is sent to Plympton 
 School His First Fight 'with J. C. BulteelIs removed to 
 Tiverton School Keeps Hounds there, and gets into trouble 
 with Dr. Richards, the Head Master Is admitted into Exeter 
 College, Oxford, in 1814. 
 
 " Boys, to the hunting field ! though 'tis November, 
 
 The wind's in the south ; but a word ere we start 
 Though keenly excited, I bid you remember 
 That hunting's a science, and riding an art." 
 
 EGERTON-WARBURTON. 
 
 THE subject of the present memoir, the Rev. 
 John Russell, was born on the 2ist of Decem- 
 ber, 1795. His father was the well-known 
 rector of Iddesleigh, in the north of Devon, 
 but resided, when John was born, and for a 
 short time afterwards, at Dartmouth, where he 
 took pupils, and at the same time kept hounds. 
 
MEMOIR OF 
 
 It is recorded of him that not only was he care- 
 ful to instruct the former in the rudiments of 
 Greek and Latin, but in those of the " noble 
 science " ; the full enjoyment of the one being 
 made subservient to the due acquirement of the 
 other. 
 
 " Work and play " was the good man's 
 motto ; and to carry out this principle he 
 adopted the novel plan of keeping a pony- 
 hunter expressly for the benefit of the boys ; 
 and he who managed to gain the highest marks 
 for his wofk during the week was rewarded 
 with sole possession of the pony on the follow- 
 ing hunting-day. 
 
 As might be expected, no stimulant could 
 have been more effective : the boys worked like 
 Trojans at their school tasks. 
 
 During this eventful era, however, the child 
 " Jack" was in petticoats; and before he became 
 old enough to compete for a mount, his father 
 removed to Southhill Rectory, near Callington. 
 But, inheriting as he did a double portion of 
 that sire's hunting blood, had the chance been 
 given him, it may well be imagined how he 
 would have stepped first and foremost into the 
 academic ring, and how he would have striven, 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 
 
 early and late, to secure so glorious a reward. 
 His " Propria quae maribus," we may be sure, 
 would have been perfect ; his knowledge of the 
 Concords and Syntax equally faultless ; nor, 
 the victory gained, would he have failed to 
 acknowledge that the day's sport, thus earned, 
 had been doubly sweetened by the very labour 
 he had taken to obtain it. 
 
 A Cornish gentleman, whose father had 
 been educated by the elder Russell, writes thus 
 to the author of these memoirs: "My father 
 has long been dead : he sleeps in the Consul's 
 garden at Tangier ; but I can well remember 
 the delight with which he was wont to talk of 
 his school days at Dartmouth, and the admira- 
 tion he felt for his dear old master. Of him he 
 would say : ' He was one of the best classics, 
 one of the best preachers and readers, and by 
 far the boldest hunter in the county of Devon. 
 Not unfrequently, too,' my father would add, 
 * have I seen the fine old fellow's top-boots 
 peeping out from under his cassock.' " 
 
 His son became a fair classical scholar, no- 
 thing more ; but, otherwise, to no one in the 
 West of England would this description apply 
 with more fidelity than to John Russell ; whose 
 
MEMOIR OF 
 
 fine sonorous voice, distinct enunciation, and 
 earnest exhortations have long established his 
 repute, both in desk and pulpit, as an ex- 
 pounder of truth second to none. A story is 
 told that, on the occasion of his preaching a 
 sermon, either at the re-opening of a church 
 newly restored, or on behalf of the North 
 Devon Hospital (to which, in this way, he has 
 ever been a ready and bountiful contributor), 
 the late Bishop of Exeter, Henry Phillpotts, 
 travelled a long distance on purpose to hear 
 him. The stout-hearted prelate, himself a 
 master of eloquence, was so taken with the 
 matter of the discourse and the style of its 
 delivery, that he pointedly expressed his com- 
 mendation of both to those assembled around 
 him at the luncheon-table. 
 
 " Yes, my lord," said a lady sitting next to 
 him, who happened to be nearly connected 
 with the preacher, and very well known as a 
 prominent rider in the hunting-field, "yes, Mr. 
 Russell is very good in the wood ; but I should 
 like your lordship to see him in the pigskin." 
 
 But, having anticipated the period of his 
 middle-life by this anecdote, it will be necessary 
 now to revert to the boy's school days, and 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 
 
 follow him through the bright but not un- 
 clouded portion of that somewhat eventful 
 time. 
 
 An old-established grammar school was 
 that of Plympton, the go-cart of Sir Joshua 
 Reynolds, to which he was first sent. There, 
 it would appear, the head master maintained 
 the block-system in full force ; not, however, 
 for the purpose of checking, but rather of ex- 
 pediting the educational progress of his pupils ; 
 for, when a boy's head appeared to be too hard 
 to comprehend and remember some crabbed 
 line of Phaedrus' Fables or Caesar's Commen- 
 taries, it was duly whacked into him at another 
 more sensitive point. 
 
 Such, however, was the training at that 
 time, which scholars like Dean Gaisford, Bishop 
 Copleston, and the late Mr. Justice Coleridge 
 were probably compelled to submit to, notwith- 
 standing the grand brains with which Nature 
 had blessed those distinguished men, 
 
 Here it was he first met his fellow-pupil, 
 John Crocker Bulteel, " the heir-apparent of 
 Flete," afterwards so well known in the county, 
 not only as a popular master of hounds, but as 
 one of the most genial and talented of men. 
 
MEMOIR OF 
 
 The old borough of Plympton the stronghold 
 of the Treby family, till the brush of the Reform 
 Bill swept away its charter was proud enough 
 of its then flourishing grammar school ; but 
 prouder still was John Bulteel of being " cock 
 of the walk" over the many juveniles who 
 flocked from all quarters to that establishment. 
 
 On more than one occasion he had ex- 
 hibited a disposition to crow over Russell, but 
 he was very soon taught a lesson that few boys 
 would be likely to forget so long as they lived. 
 Bulteel, at length, brought matters to a crisis 
 by saying something to Russell's disparage- 
 ment, in his absence, which, of course, was 
 speedily conveyed to him in an exaggerated 
 form by one of his schoolfellows. The offender, 
 however, was not to be found at the moment, 
 so Russell, seeing a book with " J. C. B." in- 
 scribed on it, pounced upon it at once, and in 
 his wrath tore it to shreds ; this he did under 
 the full conviction that Bulteel, on discover- 
 ing the outrage, would lose no time in resent- 
 ing it. 
 
 "Who tore this book ?" demanded Bulteel, 
 coming in soon after, and viewing the pages of 
 his new Gradus scattered on the school floor, 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 
 
 like autumn leaves that strew " the brooks in 
 Vallombrosa." 
 
 " I did ! " responded Russell, defiantly, as he 
 doubled his fists and prepared for the imminent 
 encounter. 
 
 " Then take that," said Bulteel, acting on 
 the principle that " the first blow is half the 
 battle," and hitting him like a flash of lightning 
 on the most prominent feature of Russell's 
 face. 
 
 A sharp and severe encounter then followed. 
 Russell, however, at length prevailed, winning, 
 as he would call it, his first spurs, and at the 
 same time securing ever after the unqualified 
 respect of his antagonist as a foeman worthy of 
 his steel. 
 
 Soon after he had attained his fourteenth 
 year, John Russell was removed to Tiverton 
 School, then under the able mastership of Dr. 
 Richards, a disciplinarian strict as Draco, who, 
 by the success of his tuition and the obedience 
 he enforced, elevated the standard of his school 
 to a rank equal to that of Reading or Sherborne 
 in their best days. Nor were the worthies of 
 Devon slack in availing themselves of these 
 and other educational advantages offered by 
 
MEMOIR OF 
 
 Blundell's school ; for, when Russell joined, it 
 was swarming with pupils, several of whom 
 represented, more or less directly, a goodly 
 portion of the county families. 
 
 He had been but a short time at this 
 Spartan seminary when, daily provoked by the 
 tyranny of a boy called Hunter, a monitor in 
 the first class, and a notorious bully, Russell 
 avowed himself a champion of the oppressed, 
 and, for his own sake and that of others, deter- 
 mined to fight him on the first opportunity. 
 Now, if a junior boy presumed to challenge a 
 monitor, it was regarded as a serious and 
 punishable offence ; but if he struck him, so 
 dire an act of insubordination was promptly 
 visited by expulsion. 
 
 To bide his time, therefore, was Russell's 
 only safe policy ; but the trial of doing so 
 tested his utmost patience ; for the longer he 
 managed to submit to Hunter's bullying, the 
 more oppressive and galling it became. The 
 long-deferred chance, however, came at last. 
 Dr. Richards having discovered that several of 
 the boys kept rabbits, gave a peremptory order 
 that they were to be got rid of forthwith. 
 Accordingly, on being dismissed from dinner 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 
 
 the owners all, with one exception, posted off 
 to dispose of their rabbits ; that exception being 
 Hunter, who, possessing a choice breed, de- 
 layed to execute the order, with the intention 
 of asking permission to send them home, on 
 the ground that his rabbits were so valuable. 
 
 Russell, in the meantime, observing the 
 monitor's neglect of duty, and ignorant of the 
 cause of it, resolved to see the edict fulfilled to 
 its bitter end, and proceeded at once to do for 
 Hunter what he seemed so loth to do for 
 himself. Russell kept ferrets, and, like most 
 boys of a manly nature, held those who kept 
 rabbits in supreme contempt, denouncing them 
 as milksops, only fit to live and associate with 
 maiden aunts. So it can well be imagined how 
 the spirit of retaliation took instant possession 
 of him, and with what zest he conveyed the 
 rabbits to his ferret-box. As well might the 
 innocent victims have been tossed into a 
 python's den, for they were all dead before the 
 owner became aware of their untimely fate or 
 his own grievous loss. 
 
 But he was not long in discovering it ; nor 
 was Russell, who avowed himself the per- 
 petrator, slow to discover that the maledictions 
 
io MEMOIR OF 
 
 and fierce threats of Hunter, who swore he 
 would give him" a sound thrashing-, would all 
 end in smoke, and that, in fact, the bully was 
 what he had suspected him to be, an arrant 
 coward. 
 
 Though older and stronger than Russell, 
 and boiling with rage, he dared not strike him, 
 which the junior fully hoped he would have 
 done ; but off he started, as fast as his legs 
 could carry him, to tell Dr. Richards, whom he 
 accosted with a torrent of tears, as he met him 
 returning on his brown cob from his daily ride 
 in the country lanes. 
 
 " What are you crying for ? " inquired the 
 really kind-hearted doctor, touched by the 
 boy's distress, and exhibiting a weakness he 
 rarely showed within the precincts of the 
 school. 
 
 " My rabbits, sir," replied Hunter, still 
 blubbering aloud ; " Russell has killed them all 
 with his ferrets." 
 
 " Killed your rabbits," responded the doctor, 
 gravely ; " and with ferrets, too ? Are they his 
 own ferrets, did you say ? " 
 
 " Oh yes, sir, his own ; he keeps a lot of 
 them," added Hunter, observing that a storm 
 
THE RE V. JOHN RUSSELL. 1 1 
 
 was brewing which would break with awful 
 effect on Russell's head. 
 
 On arriving at the school-house the culprit 
 was instantly sent for by Dr. Richards. 
 
 " Now, sir," he said, in a voice of thunder, 
 "what right have you to kill Hunter's rabbits, 
 and what reason can you give for committing 
 so gross an outrage on your schoolfellow's 
 property ? " 
 
 "It was your own order, sir," pleaded 
 Russell, fearlessly, " that all the rabbits should 
 be killed ; and as Hunter did not seem inclined 
 to kill his, I did it for him." 
 
 " And with your own ferrets, too," added 
 the doctor, seizing Russell by the collar and 
 flogging him with his long, heavy riding-whip, 
 till the whalebone appeared in splinters at its 
 end. 
 
 Many a week passed before the marks of 
 that castigation became invisible on Russell's 
 back ; but never from that day did he suffer 
 further persecution either from Hunter or any 
 other bully of the school ; for, though good- 
 natured to a fault, he was discovered to be too 
 dangerous a customer to trifle with. 
 
 Without hunting, Jack Russell could not 
 
12 MEMOIR OF 
 
 have lived ; and severe as he knew the penalty 
 would be if he were caught indulging in it, 
 still hunting he must have in some shape or 
 other. Then, as ever since, it has been the 
 one master-passion of his life. " Men," some 
 one has truly said, " do not lose their passions 
 till they get their wings ; " and certainly from 
 his earliest years Russell's passion for the chase 
 has clung to him closely as his own skin, 
 through good report and evil report, cheering 
 him in storms which few but he would have 
 faced ; and in all weather, fair or foul, asserting 
 its ruling, nay, its paramount influence over 
 him even down to the close of his life. 
 
 But after that episode with Hunter, either 
 by compulsion, or more likely from inclination, 
 Jack disposed of his ferrets, and took to keeping 
 hounds. He had already won the good-will of 
 the neighbouring farmers by joining them in 
 many a lively rat-hunt among their stacks and 
 barns ; in bolting rabbits, too, from their over- 
 stocked hedges he had ever readily lent a useful 
 hand, doing them a substantial service, and 
 treating himself to a labour of love. 
 
 This sport, however, such as it was, did not 
 long satisfy the boy's aspirations. He was 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 13 
 
 now sixteen years of age, and craved daily, as 
 he said, " for the ding-dong of hounds," a music 
 to which, by nature, his ear had been so finely 
 attuned. A schoolfellow of his own standing, 
 called Bob Bovey, appears also to have had a 
 strong strain of hunting-blood in his veins ; and 
 hearing Russell's oft-expressed wish to keep a 
 few hounds, he came to him one day, and 
 despite the danger of doing so, proposed to 
 join him in starting a pack. 
 
 Accordingly, the two boys, forming a joint 
 mastership, were very soon able to muster a 
 scratch lot, consisting of four and a half couple 
 of hounds, which they kept at a blacksmith's on 
 the outskirts of Tiverton town. The worthy 
 Vulcan must have been a kindred spirit, for he 
 seems not only to have given up a linhay adjoin- 
 ing the forge for the use of the hounds, but to 
 have run the risk of incurring Dr. Richard's 
 displeasure and losing his custom, solely for the 
 love of hunting, and the sheer sake of promot- 
 ing the sport. 
 
 Those were glorious days so long as they 
 lasted ; the farmers, to a man, seeing the hounds 
 chiefly managed by Russell, giving them a hearty 
 welcome over their land, and supporting them in 
 
14 MEMOIR OF 
 
 various ways calculated to show their cordial 
 interest in the welfare of the pack. One, for 
 instance, would say, " he'd a got a hare sitting 
 in fuzzy-park bottom, and ef Maister Rissell 
 wid on'y bring up his cry, he'd turn un out, and 
 they'd have a rare crack o' hunting, sure enow." 
 Another would inform him that " his auld blind 
 maire had mit wi' a mishap, got stogged in a 
 mire, zo he'd a knacked her in th' head, and 
 Maister Rissell was kindly welcome to her 
 vor the dags.'* 
 
 Then, there was no end to the bread-and 
 cheese and cider, which the hospitable and 
 hound-loving yeomen of that county pressed 
 upon him and his companions, whenever the 
 chase led them within hail of their farm home- 
 steads. Perhaps the happiness of a schoolboy 
 was never more complete. Being a fair classical 
 scholar, and gifted with far more than ordinary 
 abilities, which in any profession might have 
 carried him, but for his devotion to hounds, to 
 the top of the tree, he found no difficulty in 
 satisfying Dr. Richard's class -requirements, and 
 at the same time, whenever a half or a whole 
 holiday occurred, in following the pastime he so 
 keenly loved. 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 
 
 The feeling, too, that he was snatching a 
 stolen pleasure might have enhanced 
 
 "... that theft of sweet delight " 
 a hundredfold ; but dark clouds were now loom- 
 ing in the horizon, portending a short season 
 and disastrous end to this enjoyable life. A 
 shaft from some hidden enemy (and well for 
 him was it that his name was never discovered) 
 did the mischief. Some one, purporting to be 
 " a friend to good discipline," wrote to Dr. 
 Richards, and communicated the astounding 
 intelligence that a cry of hounds were kept by 
 his scholars, Bovey and Russell, and that the 
 latter, if he was not sole manager, acted at least 
 as huntsman to the pack. 
 
 11 Ringleader, in fact, of the hunting gang," 
 exclaimed Richards, indignantly, as an expres- 
 sion of grave import darkened his whole coun- 
 tenance. " What ! set my discipline at nought, 
 and bring discredit on the honoured name of 
 Blundell ?" 
 
 He sent for Bovey, and expelled him on the 
 spot. Russell came next, little doubting that he 
 should share a similar fate ; as, like a mouse 
 tortured by a cat, he underwent a preliminary 
 examination before the fatal blow fell. 
 
1 6 MEMOIR OF 
 
 " You keep hounds, don't you ? " demanded 
 the autocrat, in a stern and pitiless tone. 
 
 " No, sir." 
 
 " Do you dare to tell me a lie ? Bovey has 
 just told me you do keep them," said Richards, 
 striking him in his wrath with great violence. 
 
 " 'Tis no lie, sir," pleaded Russell, pathetic- 
 ally ; " for Bovey stole them yesterday, and sent 
 them home to his father at Pear-tree." 
 
 " Then that's lucky for you," responded the 
 doctor, " or I'd have expelled you too." 
 
 After this narrow escape, Russell, it would 
 appear, was compelled to quench as best he 
 could the latent flame that burned within him, 
 and pay due deference, at least outwardly, to the 
 more than ever strict discipline exacted by Dr. 
 Richards. 
 
 It may be inferred, too, that he was now com- 
 pelled to give more attention to his studies than 
 he had hitherto done ; for, soon after his fall as 
 a master of hounds, two prizes were offered for 
 competition an exhibition of ^30 per annum, 
 tenable for four years, and a medal for elocution 
 both of which he won in a canter, regaining at 
 the same time the favour of Dr. Richards. But, 
 had the worthy man been able to foresee the use 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 17 
 
 Jack made of the first 30 he received as an 
 exhibitioner, he would certainly have denounced 
 him as a most unworthy recipient of Blundell's 
 bounty. Our hero expended it in buying a horse 
 from the Rev. John Froude, of Knowstone ; 
 and, as he soon found to his cost, did not get 
 the best of the bargain. 
 
 The day, however, was nigh at hand when 
 the pent-up flame was destined to be no longer 
 suppressed. Oxford was before him, the seat, 
 in those days, not of learning only, but of much 
 liberty and little restraint. 
 
 In 1814, when he had just completed his 
 nineteenth year, he was admitted a commoner 
 at Exeter College, his matriculation being rather 
 a matter of form than dependent on the amount 
 of scholarship he had acquired at Tiverton 
 School. An easy-going head was Dr. Cole, the 
 rector of Exeter at that period ; the tutors, too, 
 taking their cue from him, with here and there a 
 sturdy conscientious exception, rarely interfered 
 with the daily life of the undergraduates, so 
 long as chapel and lectures were attended with 
 tolerable regularity. 
 
 Consequently, men did much as they liked 
 at all other times ; shot, fished, and hunted ; 
 
1 8 MEMOIR OF 
 
 boated, sparred, and drove tandem ; finishing 
 each day with heavy drinking and convivial 
 songs. 
 
 In this land of freedom, emancipated from 
 the Spartan discipline of Dr. Richards, and now 
 his own master, Russell found, to his unspeak- 
 able delight, an open and congenial field for 
 the cultivation of that science so deeply im- 
 planted in his nature, and in the acquirement of 
 which he had already proved himself so apt a 
 pupil. 
 
 Cicero has said that without the divine 
 afflatus no one has ever become a distinguished 
 man ; and it has been long accepted, but by 
 whose authority I believe is unknown, that a 
 poet must be born a poet, or he can never be- 
 come one either by education or art. So the 
 talent required by a huntsman must be inborn 
 the gift of nature alone or the very founda- 
 tion on which he builds, no matter how he may 
 labour, or what experience he may have, will be 
 defective and unreliable to the end. 
 
 Endowed, then, by Nature with the first and 
 most essential element required in a huntsman, 
 Russell, as might be expected, lost no chance of 
 improving the gift, and gaining by experience a 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 19 
 
 sound practical knowledge of the infinite mys- 
 teries pertaining to the " noble science." 
 
 If, however, the University, otherwise so 
 liberal with respect to its pupils, had omitted the 
 duty of providing instruction in that department, 
 Russell, at least, found no lack of first-class 
 professors in the surrounding neighbourhood. 
 Philip Payne and Will Long were at Heythrop, 
 huntsman and first whip to his Grace the sixth 
 Duke of Beaufort, who, in addition to his 
 " Home Country," hunted the Oxfordshire hills 
 in those days with his grand badger-pies ; while 
 at Bicester, Stephen Goodall, and Tom Wing- 
 field, under Sir Thomas Mostyn, possessed a 
 knowledge of woodcraft second to none in Great 
 Britain. Heroes, in fact, were those four men, 
 in their line, worthy of song as the heroes of 
 Homer. 
 
 Then there was Mr. John Codrington on the 
 Old Berkshire side, an amateur who, in all the 
 details of field or kennel management, knew 
 scarcely a whit less than his professional fellow- 
 workmen of the Oxfordshire hills and vale. 
 Being a Master of the Meynell school and an 
 ardent promoter of the modern foxhound, 
 Codrington was eminently qualified to give 
 
20 MEMOIR OF 
 
 any tyro, who had the luck to hunt with him, 
 most instructive lessons in all that pertained to 
 the newest style of breeding hounds and killing 
 a fox. 
 
 No wonder, then, that at the feet of such a 
 Gamaliel, and with such professors so near at 
 hand, Russell should have proved himself a 
 ready and proficient scholar ; nor that, with his 
 natural aspirations, quick perception, and de- 
 cisive action, he should have gained that 
 practical knowledge of the " noble science " 
 which few have attained to and none have 
 surpassed. 
 
 It was fortunate for Russell that his passion 
 for hunting was limited by the tide of his 
 exchequer, which, never overflowing, was too 
 often reduced to the lowest ebb ; for, had it 
 permitted him to hunt his four or five days a 
 week, it is very questionable if ever he would 
 have passed his final examination, and then 
 taken his degree an important matter to him, 
 although in those days by no means a difficult 
 task. He himself was wont to say, "It was no 
 marvel Oxford was so learned a place, for men 
 brought up a fair stock of school learning, but 
 carried little away with them." 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL* 21 
 
 When tempted by some hunting friend to 
 "send on," perhaps to Bicester-Windmill, or 
 Bradwell Grove an arrangement involving a 
 heavy expense as to hack, hunter, and groom 
 Russell would point pathetically to his own 
 broad chest and lament his inability to do so in 
 dolorous tones : " Impossible, my dear fellow ; 
 I'm suffering just now from tightness of the 
 chest ; it's the old complaint ; and my doctor 
 won't let me hunt at any price." 
 
 Still, hunting would have its vent, and Jack 
 managed to enjoy a liberal share of hunting, in 
 spite of Plutus and every other impediment. 
 
22 MEMOIR OF 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 Buys his First Horse at Tiverton Fair, and sees his First Stag 
 killed 'with Lord Fortescue's Hounds Learns to Spar at 
 Oxford, and Sets-to with Denne and others Wrestling 
 Matches in Devon and Cornwall his great delight. 
 
 " Pastime for princes ! prime sport of our nation ! 
 
 Strength in their sinew, and bloom on their cheek ; 
 Health to the old, to the young recreation ; 
 All for enjoyment the hunting-field seek." 
 
 EGERTON-WARBURTON. 
 
 OF the many hunting days enjoyed by Russell 
 in early life, no one stood out in such strong 
 relief as the 3Oth of September, 1814, for on it 
 he saw his first stag found and killed under 
 somewhat memorable circumstances. The 
 tedium of a long vacation at home, with little 
 or no sport to satisfy the cravings of his nature, 
 was beginning to tell heavily upon him, when 
 one day, as he sat pondering over the beauties 
 of Somerville's Chase, scarcely knowing how 
 else to amuse himself, his father appeared, and 
 with a few magic words put life into him. 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 23 
 
 " Come, Jack," he said, " my boy. The 
 hounds are going to meet at Baron's Down, 
 and I should like to show you a stag. Tiver- 
 ton Fair will take place to-morrow ; so you shall 
 go there early and buy a horse for yourself ; but 
 mind, he must be a well-bred one and up to your 
 weight." 
 
 Jack felt as if he should require a strait- 
 waistcoat almost beside himself on hearing 
 such joyous news ; for of all things on earth a 
 day with the staghounds, and that, too, on his 
 own horse, was then, in the heyday of his youth, 
 the climax of his ambition. 
 
 Accordingly, the next morning, long before 
 daylight, he was off for Tiverton Fair, at that 
 time considered the Howden of the West, so 
 far as a goodly show of Exmoor ponies, Devon- 
 shire pack-horses, and half-bred hunters could 
 justify such a comparison. Nor did he waste 
 much time in making a selection ; a brown 
 mare with big limbs and a lean head, belonging 
 to a dealer named Rookes, caught his eye, and 
 as she proved to be a good mover, and was said 
 to be a five-year-old, he bought her after a few 
 words for ^30. 
 
 Alas ! The mare proved to be only a two- 
 
24 MEMOIR OF 
 
 year-old ; but, although Russell was unmerci- 
 fully quizzed as a second Moses of green spec- 
 tacle celebrity, she turned out to be as honest a 
 beast as ever looked through a bridle. 
 
 A saddle and bridle having been readily lent 
 him by a friendly farmer, Jack, unconscious of 
 the tender age of the mare, and relying confi- 
 dently on his father's promise that " he would 
 send on a fresh horse for him to the meet," rode 
 her along at a hand canter, and without drawing 
 rein from Tiverton town-end to Baron's Down, 
 a distance, by the old road, of at least fifteen 
 miles. 
 
 " Never before, and never after," records 
 the son, " do I remember my father failing to 
 fulfil a promise he had made me ; but there, 
 at Baron's Down, for some reason which I 
 cannot now remember, the fresh horse did not 
 appear/' 
 
 The young mare was of course blown, but, 
 happily for the rider, not yet beaten. The 
 harbourer had reported a " warrantable deer ;" 
 but the woodland was a deep one in which he 
 had made his lair, and many a change took place 
 before the two couple of tufters could rouse 
 and force the right animal away. By that time 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 25 
 
 the mare, under the freshening influence of 
 gentle exercise and the breezy moor, had fairly 
 recovered herself, and as Jack avowed, was then 
 " fit as a fiddle to go for her life." 
 
 But now an awkward accident occurred that 
 suddenly checked^ and might have terminated, 
 our hero's career before he had gone ten strides 
 with the hounds. Mr. Stucley Lucas, of Baron's 
 Down, who at a later period became Master of 
 the Stag-hounds, was riding a racehorse called 
 Erebus, and, as that gentleman was known to be 
 an authority on all matters relating to the moor 
 and the running of the deer, Russell very natu- 
 rally looked to him as the pilot for the day. The 
 racer, however, appears to have had but little 
 fancy for Jack's company, for, on approaching 
 incautiously within reach of his heels, he was 
 kicked under the stirrup-iron with such force 
 that he was thrown headlong to the ground. 
 
 But as the stirrup had acted as a shield to 
 his foot, so the friendly heather, breaking the 
 violence<of his fall, saved his bones and enabled 
 him promptly to remount his steed and follow 
 the chase, if not a sadder, certainly a wiser man 
 for the rest of his life. 
 
 Jack, now taking his own line, made the best 
 
26 MEMOIR OF 
 
 of his way to Hawkridge, from the high ground 
 of which he could view the hounds driving hard, 
 and the field following at a long distance from 
 him ; and just as he had determined to start in 
 pursuit, a gentleman trotted up from an opposite 
 direction and counselled him to remain where 
 he was, " for," said he, " they'll be sure to come 
 this way, and you can see the sport better from 
 this point than if you were with them." 
 
 Comprehending intuitively that his Mentor 
 spoke with authority, Russell without hesitation 
 adopted this kind advice, and again easing his 
 mare led her to and fro along the ridge, as he 
 feasted his eyes on the wild and stirring scene 
 taking place on the opposite moor. 
 
 Russell's patience as a quiet looker-on was 
 not long tried ; for even now the heads of the 
 leading hounds were turning towards him, and 
 he could distinctly hear the deep chop of their 
 musical tongues, as, sinking the valley near 
 Tarrsteps, they crossed the Barle and pointed 
 directly for Hawkridge Moor. 
 
 Jack was now in his glory, alongside them 
 on a willing steed, and they tearing ahead over 
 the purple heather, as if on the very haunches 
 of their game. With a trimming scent and 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 27 
 
 never a check, it lasted for three long hours, 
 when the deer, to baffle the pack, took soil 
 under Slade Bridge, sinking himself in a deep 
 pool and allowing little more than his nostrils 
 to appear above the wave. 
 
 But the stratagem availed him not a rush ; 
 some five or six couple of old hounds dashed 
 into the stream, and swimming in full cry, passed 
 over him at first for a hundred or more yards ; 
 when James Tout, the huntsman, turned the 
 pack, and then casting them steadily back, they 
 winded him at once in his retreat. Every hound 
 was at him in an instant, and a gambol of por- 
 poises in that moorland stream could scarcely 
 have created a greater commotion. " There 
 stood the stag, beneath them in the stream," 
 writes Charles Kingsley, who must have wit- 
 nessed a similar turmoil, " his back against the 
 black rock, with its green cushions of dripping 
 velvet, knee-deep in the clear amber water, the 
 hounds around him, some struggling in the deep 
 pool, some rolling and tossing and splashing in 
 a mad, half-terrified ring, as he reared in the air 
 on his great haunches, with the sparkling beads 
 running off his red mane, and, dropping on his 
 knees, plunged his antlers among them with 
 
28 MEMOIR OF 
 
 blows which would have brought certain death 
 with it if the yielding water had not broken the 
 shock." 
 
 With such a scene enacted before his eyes, 
 Jack Russell must have been chained down to 
 remain a passive spectator for a single moment ; 
 nor, had Dr. Richards and all the Dons of 
 Oxford been present, could they have restrained 
 the wild impulse he felt to take part in the fray ! 
 A struggle it was for life and liberty ; the last 
 effort of the noble beast to escape from his 
 foes. Naturally, however, the young hunter's 
 sympathy being wholly with the hounds, in he 
 plunged waist-deep into the flood, eager at once 
 to encourage and help them in the somewhat 
 dangerous work of capturing and killing the 
 deer. 
 
 That event speedily followed ; and Jack, 
 being duly " blooded " according to the usage of 
 the period, received an impression of stag-hunt- 
 ing, deep-cut, enduring, and only to be effaced 
 when the stream of life ceased to flow in his 
 veins. 
 
 The late Earl Fortescue, Lord. Lieutenant 
 of the county, was at that time, from 1812 to 
 1818, Master of the Staghounds ; and " those," 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 29 
 
 Mr. Collyns tells us, "were glorious days ; 
 ninety deer, forty-two stags, and forty-eight 
 hinds having fallen in fair chase during the six 
 years of his Mastership.* The halls of Castle 
 Hill rang merrily with the wassail of the hunters, 
 and many a pink issued from the hospitable 
 seats of the neighbouring squires, on the bright 
 autumn morning, to participate in the pleasures 
 of the chase. When a good stag had been 
 killed, the custom was for James Tout, the 
 huntsman, to enter the dining-room at Castle 
 Hill after dinner in full costume, with his, horn 
 in his hand, and after he had sounded a Mort, 
 ' Success to stag-hunting ' was solemnly drunk 
 by the assembled company in port-wine, after 
 which Tout again retired ' to his own place,' 
 and rested himself after the labours of the day 
 in company with one or two favourites whose 
 escape from the kennel had been connived at. 
 There, before the ample fire, the huntsman 
 dozed away his evening, and killed his deer 
 again ; while 
 
 * The Devon and Somerset Staghounds, under the able 
 Mastership of Mr. Fenwick Bisset, killed fifty deer (stags and 
 hinds) from August to December, 1876* 
 
30 MEMOIR OF 
 
 " ' The staghound, weary with the chase, 
 Lay stretched upon the rushy floor, 
 And waged in dreams the forest race 
 From Castle Hill to wild Exmoor? " 
 
 The eyes of the noble master, being him- 
 self an enthusiastic stag-hunter, must have 
 sparkled with delight on witnessing the daring 
 ardour of the young Oxonian, as he struggled 
 through the deep water to collar the deer, and 
 finally emerged red-handed from the fight. 
 Russell, on that occasion, was not invited to 
 enjoy the princely hospitality of Castle Hill, 
 and to celebrate in due form the death of his 
 first deer ; but, if such honour had been done 
 him, certain it is that he would have been the 
 first of the company to forswear the wassail 
 bowl, and to bid one and all an early " good- 
 night." For has not his old friend, the late 
 accomplished and much-beloved Devonshire 
 squire, George Templer of Stover, chronicled 
 his unvarying habit in this respect ? In poetic 
 strain he writes thus of him : 
 
 "Another Prime Minister rode from the North, 
 Of his talents Southmolton can best tell the worth ; 
 So prone to the -chase that he followed each scent, 
 From the stag in the forest to ' bubble-a-vent ; ' 
 More attached to his bed than a lover of wine, 
 He was sure to be sound on his pillow at nine." 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 
 
 " Bubble-a-vent is a term used in otter 
 hunting ; when the quarry, bolting in a hurry 
 or becoming distressed by the chase, is com- 
 pelled to vent ; and thus, by a chain of silver 
 bubbles rising to the surface, unconsciously 
 reveals his course beneath the turbid wave. 
 But more of that anon ; when Russell himself, 
 a few years afterwards, started a pack of otter- 
 hounds, and, as he says, " did little more than 
 disturb the sleeping echoes of the North Devon 
 combes." 
 
 It was but a short time since, namely in 
 1876, when he was dining with the present 
 Lord Fortescue at Castle Hill, that the remem- 
 brance of his first entry with staghounds in 
 1814 was brought back to his mind with vivid 
 effect after the lapse of so many years. He had 
 said "good night" to his hospitable and kind 
 host, and, homeward bound, was making his 
 way towards the hall door, accompanied by 
 some of the junior members of the family 
 holding on to his skirt, when Lord Ebrington 
 begged him to relate when and where he had 
 seen his first stag killed. 
 
 " With your grandfather," was the ready 
 reply ; " we found him in Padwells, and killed 
 
32 MEMOIR OF 
 
 him on the Barle, under Slade Bridge, on the 
 3<3th of September, 1814; and there he is," 
 added Russell, catching sight at that instant of 
 the head and antlers of the very animal, under 
 the frontlet of which appeared a tablet indi- 
 cating the above particulars. 
 
 Those who have once heard Russell tell a 
 story, especially if hunting were the theme, will 
 never forget the charm of his graphic touches, 
 the intensity of his tone, and the point he had 
 the power of imparting to the minutest detail. 
 They will remember it as a picture painted by 
 a master-hand, with its light and shade strong 
 as one of Rembrandt's ; a picture true to life as 
 was ever transferred to canvas. 
 
 It may well be imagined, then, how effec- 
 tually those poetic touches must have inspired 
 his youthful hearers with a longing to traverse 
 the same wild moors, to witness the same 
 exciting scenes, and to play their part as their 
 forefathers and he had done, with like energy 
 and like love for the manly game. With hunt- 
 ing blood already running richly in their veins, 
 he must have stirred it to the very depths of 
 their hearts ; and, beyond all doubt, the poetry 
 of the scene, the music of the hounds, and 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 33 
 
 the odour of the heather will cling to their 
 memories for many a day to come. 
 
 Russell's return to Oxford about the 2Oth 
 of October brought his stag-hunting to a close 
 for the remainder of that season ; but he must 
 have been a gourmand indeed, if the bountiful 
 bill of fare provided by Alma Mater did not 
 fully satisfy his physical as well as mental 
 requirements. He had only been a short time 
 in residence at Exeter when a Kentish man, 
 called Denne of Lydd, a gentleman-commoner 
 of the same college, introduced him to a pro- 
 fessor of pugilism, one Rowlands, who, having 
 graduated in the school founded by John 
 Broughton and the Duke of Cumberland, had 
 come down from Westminster to instruct the 
 youth of Oxford in the then popular art of 
 self-defence. 
 
 Jack, now standing just six feet in his shoes, 
 furnished with big limbs, a long reach, and 
 withal a stalwart frame, required little persua- 
 sion from his friend Denne to attend and take 
 part in the course of muscular lectures delivered 
 by Rowlands in that gentleman's rooms. Nor 
 was it long ere the professor was able to pro- 
 nounce him one of his most promising pupils 
 
 3 
 
34 MEMOIR OF 
 
 a compliment duly appreciated by Russell, who, 
 although far from being either a quarrelsome or 
 a pugnacious character, possessed the ambition 
 of Caesar, if attacked, to prove himself a man to 
 the backbone. 
 
 In those days Exeter College teemed with 
 gentlemen - commoners, who, as a rule, were 
 either the eldest sons of large landed proprie- 
 tors in the West of England; or men already in 
 possession of their paternal acres, to whom the 
 payment of double fees was a matter of less 
 consideration than the distinction conferred by 
 the silk gown and velvet cap, which the Univer- 
 sity permitted them to wear. They dined, too, 
 at a separate table from the commoners, namely, 
 at the first below the dais ; and, exalted by these 
 and other privileges, here and there a fool would 
 give himself airs and affect to consider the latter 
 simply as beings of an inferior caste, companion- 
 ship with whom it was his bounden duty to 
 eschew. 
 
 Such was Gordon, a gentleman-commoner 
 of Exeter at that time ; a conceited young 
 spark, whose chief ambition it was to associate 
 with out-college men, especially those of Christ 
 Church, to quote their sayings and doings at 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 35 
 
 every turn, and, in reference thereto, to institute 
 comparisons far from complimentary to the 
 members of his own college. In fact, he was a 
 tuft-hunter, and doubtless suffered as much con- 
 tempt from the men whom he courted as from 
 those whose society he would fain have ignored. 
 Denne, on the other hand, was as fine a 
 specimen of manhood as ever stepped in shoe- 
 leather ; independent as Achilles himself, lithe, 
 long-limbed, and of rare muscular development ; 
 he might have taken rank among the Promachi 
 of old, so skilled was he in the use of the csestus, 
 and so powerful was his blow. At Eton he had 
 been contemporary with Ball Hughes, the noted 
 dandy of the 7th Hussars; with Harris of 
 Hayne, the ally and strenuous supporter of 
 Russell in after days ; and with that far-famed 
 sportsman, Sir Harry Goodricke. Denne was 
 there distinguished as a great foot-ball player ; 
 but especially as the avenger of the lower boys, 
 who never failed to find shelter under his aegis, 
 when oppressed by the bullies of the upper 
 school. At Oxford, in a town-and-gown row, 
 he had knocked down the ringleader of the mob 
 a prize-fighting butcher, the terror of the 
 slums with such force that his comrades who 
 
36 MEMOIR OF 
 
 lifted him up carried him to the rear in a state 
 of insensibility, shouting as they did so that a 
 coroner's inquest would sit upon the corpse, 
 and hang Denne for the murder. 
 
 The butcher, however, lived to fight at 
 many a town-and-gown row after that day, but 
 never again could be induced to confront Denne 
 in single combat, either by the jeers of the 
 gownsmen or the encouragement of his friends. 
 
 It was only at rare intervals that Gordon 
 favoured the hall at Exeter with his company 
 at dinner, for as a general rule he preferred 
 taking that meal with his Christ Church friends, 
 either at Saddler's, the Mitre, or at the Maiden- 
 head Hotel. But dropping in on one occasion, 
 he had scarcely been seated five minutes at 
 table when the "art of sparring" became the 
 subject of conversation, and the insolent tone in 
 which he vaunted the prowess of the Christ 
 Church men, and disparaged that of his own 
 college, so disturbed the usually placid current 
 of Denne's temper, that he challenged him 
 forthwith to arrange a meeting and prove his 
 words. 
 
 " Bring your three best men," he said, " from 
 Christ Church to my rooms, and if they can 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 37 
 
 only stand up in a fair set-to against three of 
 Exeter, we'll give your heroes full credit for all 
 you say of them, but not till then." 
 
 " Thank you, Denne, for your most courteous 
 insinuation," replied Gordon, curling his upper 
 lip, and speaking in atone of the bitterest irony; 
 " there will be no difficulty whatever in finding 
 three good men and true to accept your chal- 
 lenge ; indeed, a score, if necessary, would be 
 forthcoming, so name your day, and they shall 
 be ready." 
 
 It was not usual for the commoners, before 
 the high table had risen, to move from their 
 seats and hold conversation with those at 
 another table, much less with the gentlemen- 
 commoners ; but Russell, who was seated at a 
 short distance below the latter, and had over- 
 heard all that had passed, could restrain himself 
 no longer. " Don't forget me, Denne," he said, 
 jumping on his legs and stalking up to his 
 friend's side ; " I'll be one of the three, mind 
 that, and the sooner we meet the better." 
 
 The Fiery Cross of Clan-Alpine was never 
 carried with such speed through the Trosachs 
 as Gordon's message to the Christ Church men ; 
 nor did the interest excited by it flag for an 
 
38 MEMOIR OF 
 
 instant, till three of them had been chosen, who, 
 in the opinion of all, were best qualified to 
 accept the challenge and carry to the front the 
 colours of the college. 
 
 On a fixed day, then, soon afterwards, the 
 party on both sides having assembled in Denne's 
 rooms, with Gordon alone to witness the match, 
 Russell was deputed to open the ball, the anta- 
 gonist selected to meet him being the second 
 best man of the Christ Church lot. It was a 
 brisk set-to while it lasted, but, evidently, a one- 
 sided affair from beginning to end ; for Russell's 
 long reach, and quick, straight blows, which fell 
 with tremendous thuds on his adversary's visage, 
 brought the trial to a close in little more than 
 ten minutes. 
 
 The latter, admitting himself overmatched, 
 then declined the unequal contest ; while Russell, 
 self-reliant and still "fresh as paint," refused to 
 take off his gloves, calling stoutly for the next 
 man to come on. Denne, however, interposed 
 and would have his turn ; going in first with 
 No. i, then No. 3, and finally polishing them 
 both off with as much ease as if they had been 
 two old women. 
 
 " Now," said Russell, addressing Gordon 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 39 
 
 aside, " I think you had better take your three 
 fellows home ; and don't make such fools of 
 them again." 
 
 But the meeting did not end there. Denne, 
 willing to show the Christ Church men what a 
 real set-to meant, invited Russell to put on the 
 gloves with him and give them a lesson. Now, 
 Denne being a master-hand at the work, it was 
 no joke setting to with him, for Rowlands him- 
 self had acknowledged that he could teach him 
 nothing. Nevertheless, Russell, regardless of 
 the punishment he knew must follow, responded 
 readily to the summons. He stood up, and 
 stopped and countered with the coolness of a 
 professional, but, as he soon found, to little pur- 
 pose. Denne forced him into a corner, paused 
 a moment, and thus warned him : " Now, Jack, 
 you are going to catch it ! " 
 
 " Perhaps I am,' r said the other; "but don't 
 make too sure of that." 
 
 The words had scarcely escaped the enclo- 
 sure of his teeth, ere a tremendous left-hander, 
 coming straight from the shoulder, caught him 
 on the lower jaw with such violence that it sent 
 him reeling against a table, bringing him and 
 it to the ground with a fearful crash. " I 
 
40 MEMOIR OF 
 
 really thought," said Russell, relating the story 
 to a friend long afterwards, " that my chin 
 had been knocked away ; nor could I masti- 
 cate a bit of roast beef for many a subsequent 
 day. 1 
 
 On the table that fell with him had stood 
 a brass-bound writing-desk, which, besides the 
 usual materials of such an article, contained a 
 number of letters and notes, curiously folded, 
 and written on coloured and gold-edged paper, 
 while not a few other souvenirs, more or less 
 valuable, were scattered broadcast on the floor. 
 Shocked apparently by this unwonted exposure, 
 Denne, amid an outburst of laughter from the 
 Christ Church men, dropped on his knees as if 
 he was shot, and, gathering the precious favours 
 together, crammed them again into the trea- 
 cherous receptacle, denouncing as he did so, 
 in no measured terms, the ill-luck that had 
 revealed them to view. " 
 
 Denne, like a good fellow, did his best to 
 solace the wounded pride of his visitors by 
 giving them a sumptuous champagne breakfast ; 
 but, " nothing could a charm impart " to Gor- 
 don's spirits, who, according to Russell, " carried 
 his tail between his legs like a cur-dog that had 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 41 
 
 been worrying sheep, and from that day never 
 cocked it again." 
 
 Prize-fighting was then the order of the 
 day ; and a set-to between two professionals of 
 celebrity would bring together men of all ranks, 
 patricians and proletarians, from the most re- 
 mote parts of England, to witness what it would 
 have been heresy then to call a barbarous ex- 
 hibition. The vale of Bicester, being on the 
 borders of two counties, was a convenient ren- 
 dezvous for such encounters ; and thither, on 
 the occasion of a grand fight, the University 
 would pour forth its legion of gownsmen ; some 
 betting heavily on the event, and some, chiefly 
 amateurs in boxing, going there for the sole 
 purpose of taking a first-class lesson in the 
 " noble art of self-defence." 
 
 For such ruffianism, however, Russell had 
 no taste ; nor, skilled though he was in spar- 
 ring, could he ever be induced to ride even so 
 far as Bicester to witness a prize-fight. 
 
 " No ! " he would say to Denne and others 
 pressing him to accompany them, " if I do get 
 on a horse, it shall be to see a hound with his 
 natural enemy, a fox, before him a cross- 
 country fight, not one in a ring." 
 
42 MEMOIR OF 
 
 Still, the Greeks of Homer's song never 
 enjoyed the display of athletic skill more em- 
 phatically than John Russell ; for, when a " turn 
 at wrastling " was about to be played be- 
 tween Cann and Polkinghorn -the champions 
 respectively of Devon and Cornwall he has 
 ridden a hundred miles in a day to see the 
 manly game come off. Then, if Cann, his com- 
 patriot, proved successful in giving his adver- 
 sary a fair back-fall, i.e., in bringing three points 
 of his back to the earth without touching it 
 with his limbs, every star in the sky would 
 have cheered him on his long ride home ; ay, 
 and he would not have failed to describe every 
 feature of the " play " for months afterwards 
 with sparkling comment and unflagging zest. 
 
 Prize-fighting, indeed, popular as it was 
 during the first quarter of the present century, 
 never appears to have taken the same hold of 
 the public mind in Devon and Cornwall as it 
 did in other parts of the United Kingdom. 
 The worthies of those counties adhered, with 
 better taste, to their ancient and manly game 
 of wrestling, which they rightly regarded as 
 testing to the utmost the strength, skill, and 
 courage of the combatants ; but, at the same 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 43 
 
 time, exhibiting none of the brutality that in- 
 variably characterized every pugilistic en- 
 counter. 
 
 During the summer season, but especially 
 at that period of it between the hay and corn 
 harvest, when the cereals were assuming a 
 golden hue, and the orchards bending under 
 their burden of fruit, there was scarcely a large 
 village in the West which did not offer its 
 prizes, and enjoy annually the time-honoured 
 spectacle of a game at wrestling, the players 
 coming from all parts to contend for the 
 mastery. 
 
 I have heard Russell relate that, on a cer- 
 tain Sunday while at church in Cornwall, he 
 saw a man posted just outside the churchyard 
 gate ; six silver spoons were stuck into the 
 band of his hat, and there he stood, shouting at 
 the top of his voice : " Plaize to tak' notiss. 
 Thaise zix zilver spunes to be wrastled vor next 
 Thursday, at Poughill, and all gen'lemen wrast- 
 lers will receive fair play." The man, with the 
 spoons in his hat, then entered the church, went 
 up into the " singing gallery," and hung it on a 
 peg, from which it was perfectly visible to the 
 parson and the greater part of his congregation. 
 
44 MEMOIR OF 
 
 On another occasion in the same locality, 
 but not in the same church, snow lying deep on 
 the ground, the clergyman was reading the 
 second lesson, when a man opened the church 
 door, and, with a loud voice, proclaimed, " I've 
 a got 'un ! " and immediately withdrew. But 
 he had sounded the well-known note ; every 
 farmer and labourer who possessed a gun soon 
 followed him, and, within a couple of hours, 
 brought to the village inn a fine old fox, dug 
 out and murdered in cold blood. 
 
 As in Cornwall, so formerly in the forest of 
 Dartmoor; Tom French, the once notorious 
 vulpicide, was wont to say of a fox, " 'Tis a 
 nasty varmint, I tell 'ee, and aufght to be killed 
 on a Sunday, so well as on a week day"; a 
 doctrine he was not slow to practise, especially 
 when a fall of snow gave him the chance : 
 
 " While faithless snaws ilk step betray 
 
 Whar he has been . 
 
 BURNS. 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 45 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 A Day with the Heythrop and Sir T/wmas Mostyrfs Packs 
 Russell's Terriers Anecdotes of "Tip" and " Nelson " The 
 Process of Manufacturing so-called " Fox-terriers " for the 
 Market. 
 
 " They ehamp'd the bit and tvvitch'd the rein, 
 And paw'd the frozen earth in vain ; 
 Impatient with fleet hoof to scour 
 The vale, each minute seem'd an hour." 
 
 EGERTON-WARBURTON. 
 
 FROM the period of his -first matriculation at 
 Oxford to that on which he donned his bache- 
 lor's gown and quitted the University, Russell 
 appears to have kept no regular record of his 
 hunting days. Nevertheless, when in genial 
 company, the sport and incidents of many a 
 run, witnessed at that time and chronicled on 
 the unwritten pages of his memory, were still 
 ever and anon flashed out with the freshness of 
 a schoolboy who has only recently enjoyed his 
 first mount with a pack of hounds. Upwards 
 of sixty years had rolled by since then ; yet 
 
46 ' MEMOIR OF 
 
 every detail of those early scenes he still painted 
 in colours so fresh and vivid, that it was difficult 
 to believe they could have occurred in the days 
 " when George the Third was King." 
 
 The man who has once heard Russell hold 
 forth on some favourite topic, must indeed have 
 a very defective memory if he ever forget the 
 charm of his earnest, natural manner, or the 
 epigrammatic and pointed style in which he 
 was wont to tell the simplest tale ; like the 
 Wedding-guest, the listener " cannot choose 
 but hear," spell-bound at once by his glittering 
 eye and winged words. 
 
 To attempt a description of the sport he 
 saw with hounds during his residence at Ox- 
 ford, in the absence of written records, would 
 be a task beyond the design of the present 
 memoir ; but the adventure of one disastrous 
 day, on which he went to a distant meet and 
 never saw a hound, must not be omitted, for it 
 left such an impression on his memory that to 
 his latest hour he spoke of it with mixed feel- 
 ings of disappointment and remorse. 
 
 The fixture was Sandford Brake ; the hounds 
 those of his Grace the sixth Duke of Beaufort, 
 who, as [the reader has already been informed, 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 47 
 
 hunted the Oxfordshire Hills from Heythrop 
 at one season of the year, and his " home 
 country " from Badminton at another. The 
 fame of the pack, the favourite colour being 
 badger-pie, had at this period traversed the 
 length and breadth of the land. There were 
 no hounds like them ; none that combined so 
 perfectly the close hunting and hard driving 
 qualities required in a foxhound ; none that 
 surpassed them in power, symmetry, and gran- 
 deur of form. 
 
 Russell had never yet seen this noble pack ; 
 but at every wine and supper party he attended, 
 if there were any hunting men present, the 
 chief theme of their conversation invariably 
 turned on the Beaufort badger-pies ; so it may 
 well be imagined how he longed to feast his 
 eyes on so attractive a sight, to watch them at 
 work, and enjoy the sport they so rarely failed 
 to show. 
 
 With his head, then, brimful of such antici- 
 pations, dry indeed must he have found the 
 task of getting up the Greek lecture over which 
 he was poring, when one morning his friend 
 Peter Jackson, a Yorkshireman devoted to 
 hounds, rushed into his rooms, and exhibiting a 
 
48 MEMOIR OF 
 
 card of the Hunting Appointments, put his 
 finger on " Sandford Brake," and said : 
 
 " Now, then, Russell, throw that physic to 
 the dogs ; here's a chance of seeing the Hey- 
 throp Hounds ; let's be off at once to secure 
 the two best nags we can find in Oxford." 
 
 No invitation could have been more accept- 
 able. 
 
 "With all my heart," responded Russell, 
 chucking his Herodotus to the far end of the 
 room, and starting off, in company with his 
 friend, to Austin's stables, reputed in those days 
 to be the first in Oxford. 
 
 Their selection was soon made ; Jackson 
 choosing a big thorough-bred chestnut, with 
 sloping shoulders, flat hocks, and rare sinewy 
 thighs ; while Russell fixed on a well-known 
 horse called " Charlie," which, though " speech- 
 less in one eye," Austin declared " could see a 
 weak place in a bullfinch better than ever a 
 horse in his stable." 
 
 Accordingly, on the day before the meet, 
 Charlie and the chestnut, ridden by a couple of 
 grooms, were duly " sent on " to the Chequers 
 Inn, there to rest for the night, the stables of 
 that hostelry being only at a short distance from 
 
THE RE F. JOHN RUSSELL. 49 
 
 the cover-side ; while, in the morning, if Russell 
 and his friend had been mounted on two fiery 
 dragons, they could scarcely have been carried 
 through the air with more speed and impetuosity 
 than by the two raw-boned hacks which, ewe- 
 necked and clean as Eclipse in their pasterns, 
 bore them to the meet in so short a time. 
 
 But, could they have anticipated the fruit- 
 lessness of their haste, they might have spared 
 the poor brutes* legs, and their own pockets at 
 the same time ; for the roads were hard as iron, 
 and no hounds had as yet arrived. In fact, a 
 keen north wind had set in at daybreak, and 
 although a goodly company had mustered at 
 the cover-side, a feeling of mistrust prevailed, 
 that unless a speedy change took place, hunting 
 would be out of the question for that day. 
 
 Now it was, for the first time, that Russell 
 met those celebrated brothers, Mr. Rawlinson 
 of Chadlington and Mr. Lindo, a pair of reso- 
 lute and brilliant horsemen who were not to be 
 beaten in any country. The former will also 
 be remembered as the owner of Revenge and 
 Ruby, and subsequently of Coronation, winner 
 of the Derby in 1841 ; while, of the latter, it is 
 scarcely too much to say that every hunting man 
 
 4 
 
So MEMOIR OF 
 
 in the kingdom either knew him personally or 
 knew him by his portrait, which, admirably 
 painted by some sporting artist, appeared in all 
 the print-shops of town and country at that 
 period. Even on snuff-boxes Mr. Lindo might 
 have been seen standing up in his stirrups, and 
 going " a slapping pace " on his famous horse 
 the Clipper a horse so quick at his fences, 
 that it was said he could " go a mile and a half 
 over a country while others were going a 
 mile." 
 
 But the man of all others who attracted the 
 admiration of our Oxonians was Sir Henry 
 Peyton, the second baronet of that name. He 
 had driven four greys to the meet, and with 
 characteristic good-nature had entered at once 
 into a horse - and - hound conversation with 
 Russell, whose impatience at hot seeing the 
 hounds he had observed with no little sym- 
 pathy. 
 
 " 'Tis a north-easter, keen as a knife," said 
 the baronet, pointing with his crop to the very 
 eye of the wind. " Hard lines on you, young 
 fellow, for I dare say you've cut lecture to come 
 here, and now, I fear, the hounds are going to 
 cut you." 
 
THE RE V. JOHN R US SELL. 5 1 
 
 " I hope not, Sir Henry ; for that would be 
 the unkindest cut of all." 
 
 " Never mind ! come again ; better luck 
 next time. I knew by the going of the near 
 leader that the road was getting harder and 
 harder every yard of the way. I've lately had 
 him nerved ; and when there's a touch of frost 
 in the ground he can't keep his secret a bit ; but 
 he's all right at other times." 
 
 " I can see nothing amiss, Sir Henry," 
 replied Russell, whose interest in that new 
 operation, which he now heard of for the first 
 time, made him forget for a moment the non- 
 arrival of the hounds ; "he looks, however, like 
 a hunter all over." 
 
 " The cleverest horse across country I ever 
 owned," said the baronet, right pleased with the 
 observant remark. He then took up the fore- 
 leg of the leader, and drew Russell's attention 
 to the all but invisible marks of the operator's 
 skill, adding, " It's an ill wind that blows no 
 luck ; for he bids fair to be as good in harness 
 as out of it ; so I ought not to grumble." 
 
 No man of that day, as Russell well knew, 
 could do more with a horse than Sir Henry 
 Peyton. In the saddle or on the box, he was 
 
52 MEMOIR OF 
 
 equally at home ; the prince of all coachmen, 
 gentle or simple, and as brilliant a performer 
 across a country as ever rode to hounds. 
 
 A small knot of gentlemen had now gathered 
 round the drag, admiring the well-appointed 
 team, and exchanging short greetings with its 
 pleasant owner, when at length a horseman in 
 green plush, pricking along at a quick trot 
 towards the meet, was viewed in the distance, 
 and at once recognized as Will Long. 
 
 " His Grace's compliments to the field," said 
 the well-mannered whip, as he lifted his cap 
 respectfully to one and all, "and begs to say 
 the frost is too hard to take the hounds out of 
 kennel." 
 
 " Then," said Russell, in an agony of disap- 
 pointment, " I hope when you get back that 
 you'll find them all dead on their benches." 
 
 It is almost needless to say that, if such a 
 calamity had -occurred, no man on earth would 
 have deplored it more than John Russell, as 
 every one who knew the humanity of his 
 nature and his love for a hound will readily 
 understand. Hard words they were, it is true ; 
 but, beyond all doubt, they were words only, 
 and not wishes, which he thus allowed himself 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 53 
 
 to blurt out ; and, as the keenest remorse over- 
 took him with no limping foot, let us hope that 
 the recording angel has long since blotted out 
 the angry speech for ever. Will Long, however, 
 never forgot it ; for, years afterwards, when the 
 " chilling touch of Time " had turned the locks 
 of both of them to silver-grey, and they were 
 returning together to Badminton, after a hard 
 day with the present Duke's hounds, Russell 
 asked him if he remembered the first time they 
 met at Sandford Brake. 
 
 " Yes, sir," said Will, " and I'm not likely to 
 forget it. You hoped I should find all the 
 hounds dead upon the benches. But there, I 
 didn't think you meant it." 
 
 " Quite right, Will ; in two minutes after- 
 wards I could have bitten my tongue out for 
 having made such a speech." 
 
 It is impossible to overrate the estimation 
 and respect with which Will Long was re- 
 garded, not only by the Beaufort family, but by 
 all who followed him to the chase and enjoyed 
 his cheery company in days gone by ; still, bril- 
 liant horseman as he was acknowledged to be, 
 I have heard Russell declare that as a practical 
 huntsman he could never hold a candle to old 
 
54 MEMOIR OF 
 
 Philip Payne nor to the present Duke. That 
 probably was the case : nevertheless it must 
 not be forgotten that Will Long hunted those 
 hounds with signal success from 1826 down to 
 October, 1855, a period of twenty-nine years ; 
 when, overtaken at length by the infirmities of 
 age, he retired from active service, carrying with 
 him his well-earned laurels, and enjoying, by 
 the bounty of his noble master, a comfortable 
 cottage, a steady hunter, and a handsome pen- 
 sion to the last day of his long life. In Feb- 
 ruary, 1877, poor Will was borne to his narrow 
 home " an earth made for rest " at the patri- 
 archal age of fourscore years and four. He was 
 buried at Oldbury-on-the-Hill, where Philip 
 Payne lies ; and never to its kindred clay were 
 committed the relics of a kindlier spirit or a 
 truer man : 
 
 " Reliquit equos, cornu, canes, 
 Tandem quiescant ejus manes." 
 
 The last time Russell met him he inquired 
 if his brother Michael were yet alive. 
 
 " Yes," replied Russell, " and well too." 
 "I'm glad to hear that," responded the 
 veteran; "he gave my son Nimrod his first 
 mount, took him out of my wife's arms and held 
 
THE RE V. JOHN R US SELL. 5 5 
 
 him on the saddle when he was only a month 
 old. Please give him my duty." An early 
 entry this for that well-known huntsman, 
 Nimrod Long. 
 
 Among the many hunting friends with 
 whom Russell associated at Oxford, there was 
 no one, perhaps, whose sympathies accorded so 
 closely with his own as did those of Mr. Philip 
 Dauncey, of Little Horwood, a Buckingham- 
 shire gentleman, even then distinguished as a 
 bold rider and thorough houndsman ; and who 
 subsequently became widely known as a suc- 
 cessful breeder of Guernsey cows, the cream 
 and butter of which obtained such high favour 
 in the royal household. Like tendencies, the 
 love of hunting, with all its accompanying 
 charms, had brought them together on many 
 occasions to the merry cover-side ; but one 
 day, on which they had met Sir Thomas 
 Mostyn's hounds, stood out in strong relief 
 on the tablet of Russell's memory, and pro- 
 bably left a like impression on that of Mr. 
 Dauncey. 
 
 Stephen Goodall, a real Titan himself, and 
 the progenitor of a race of Titans the three 
 Goodalls of whom the country that bred them 
 
56 MEMOIR OF 
 
 may well be proud, was about to draw a small 
 willow spinney on the north side of Bletching- 
 ton House, when a fox, closely pursued by the 
 Duke of Beaufort's pack, crossed in view of his 
 hounds, and, putting his head like an arrow for 
 Gravenall Wood, led the now united field and 
 packs at a terrific pace over the stiffest portion 
 of the Bicester Vale. The brook is a bumper, 
 even with its banks that brook which has bap- 
 tized more Oxford men than any parson in the 
 county and the hounds, five or six couple 
 abreast, are flinging desperately for the lead, as 
 they make straight for the stream, and dash into 
 it amid a cloud of spray. 
 
 " Give them room, gentlemen, do," shouted 
 Will Long to the field, as his horse, pricking 
 his ears and measuring the tide, was the first to 
 sweep over, like a swallow on a summer's eve. 
 Rivalry was running high, and the warning was 
 little heeded by a couple of Heythrop thrusters, 
 who, pressing too closely on Will's heels, gave 
 their horses no chance of distinguishing the 
 water lying on the bank from the real channel 
 of the brook ; consequently they floundered 
 headlong into the flood ; and, like the famous 
 Brewers, immortalized by Mr. Egerton-War- 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 57 
 
 burton, they very narrowly escaped " a watery 
 bier? 
 
 Russell and Dauncey were more fortunate ; 
 the latter on a game little mare, well bred and 
 stout as whalebone, and the other on old 
 Charlie, taking it evenly in their strides, and 
 landing together on the right side, a bowshot 
 clear of the pack ; while Lord Jersey, Sir 
 Henry Peyton, Captain Evans, and Tom Wing- 
 field men whom nothing but the Styx itself 
 could stop were the only others well up, as the 
 hounds, now all but mute and carrying a des- 
 perate head, were breaking the fence into the 
 lower quarter of Gravenall Wood. 
 
 But the fox was sinking ; and Will Long, 
 acting as whip and huntsman in one (for Philip 
 Payne, Stephen, and Griff Lloyd had not yet 
 crossed the Rubicon), knew it full well, as he 
 dashed over the cover fence and rang out the 
 death-knell in a strain of ecstatic delight. 
 
 " Never before," said Russell, as he de- 
 scribed the scene to an old friend, " never 
 before had I witnessed so glorious a run ; and 
 you may well imagine the pride I felt on finding 
 myself in such good company. I could have 
 hugged old Charlie on the spot! And as for 
 
58 MEMOIR OF 
 
 Will Long, I looked upon him as something 
 more than mortal a demigod in disguise." 
 
 The Christ Church drag, consisting recently 
 of four and a half couple of hounds with a bag 
 of aniseed or a red herring for their fox, had, I 
 believe, no existence in those days at all 
 events, I never heard Russell allude to it ; but 
 if such had existed, he certainly would have 
 been the last man to join so spurious and ques- 
 tionable a sport. The love of orthodox hunt- 
 ing ; the instinct of the hound in its fullest 
 development ; the science, in fact, so ably 
 taught by such men as Philip Payne, Stephen 
 Goodall, and Mr. John Codrington, had already 
 taken so strong a hold of his mind and that of 
 his contemporaries, that they were little likely 
 to swerve from the faith and fall into such a 
 heresy. 
 
 The use of the hound for the purpose of 
 hunting a red herring was certainly never con- 
 templated by Somerville when he penned 
 
 " The chase I sing, hounds and their various breed, 
 And no less various use." 
 
 No ! the poet's animated and fine verse 
 applies only, as we know, to the chase of the 
 
THE RE V. JOHN R US SELL. 59 
 
 stag, the fox, the otter, and the hare, those deni- 
 zens of the stream and forest the legitimate 
 " beasts of venerie" in all ages. In any pack 
 of Russell's, hunted by him during the last fifty 
 years, the fate of a hound touching on such riot 
 would have been quickly sealed ; on returning 
 to his kennel I can almost hear him say to old 
 Will Rawle, his faithful and devoted henchman 
 for forty years, " Will, that hound eats no more 
 of my meal, mind that ; " and the culprit would 
 thenceforth disappear from the scene. 
 
 In less than ten years, however, after Russell 
 had taken his degree, steeple-chasing, with its 
 concomitant vice of heavy betting, became the 
 popular amusement of the University ; and about 
 the same period the drag, established at Christ 
 Church, provided an afternoon " grind " across 
 country for the men, who either were unable to 
 cut college lectures, or cared not a rush whether 
 it was a fox or a red hen ing they rode after, so 
 long as they had their " grind." 
 
 The line of country chosen for the drag was 
 generally a stiff one, and the pace frequently a 
 cracker from first to last, consequently the stay- 
 ing powers of every hack-hunter in Oxford were 
 gauged to a pound ; and bitter enough were the 
 
60 MEMOIR OF 
 
 complaints of the stable-keepers at the beaten 
 and maimed condition in which their horses 
 were often brought home after a day with the 
 drag. 
 
 " No, sir," said Squeaker Smith to a member 
 of Christ Church, surnamed Hard-riding Dick, 
 " no, sir, you ain't a-going to have a horse of 
 mine again in a hurry for that drag ; I picked 
 thorns enough to make a crow's nest out of 
 Woodman's legs the last time you rode him, 
 and he never touched a grain of corn for a week 
 afterwards. 'Tisn't hunting, nor 'tisn't hacking ; 
 but, to speak plainly, 'tis barbarous cruelty to a 
 noble animal. 1 * 
 
 Smith was quite right ; and Russell, had he 
 been present, would have highly commended 
 the humanity of his decision. 
 
 Russell had been in residence some fourteen 
 terms, and was now, with a view to his final 
 examination, busily employed in preparing 
 for the schools and furbishing up his old 
 Tiverton armour, which, he was not slow 
 to discover, had grown somewhat rusty by 
 habitual disuse and the easy conditions of 
 his college life. His degree being of para- 
 mount importance to him, the short period that 
 
THE RE V. JOHN R US SELL. 6 1 
 
 now remained for getting up his books was 
 naturally accompanied by the inevitable doubt 
 and anxiety, which even the ablest scholars are 
 apt to feel at such a time. 
 
 It was on a glorious afternoon towards the 
 
 end of May, when strolling round Magdalen 
 
 meadow with Horace in hand, but Beckford in 
 
 his head, he emerged from the classic shade of 
 
 Addison's Walk, crossed the Cherwell in a punt, 
 
 and passed over in the direction of Marston, 
 
 hoping to devote an hour or two to study in the 
 
 quiet meads of that hamlet, near the charming 
 
 slopes of Elsfield, or in the deeper and more 
 
 secluded haunts of Shotover Wood. But 
 
 before he had reached Marston a milkman 
 
 met him with a terrier such an animal as 
 
 Russell had as yet only seen in his dreams ; 
 
 he halted, as Actaeon might have done when 
 
 he caught sight of Diana disporting in her 
 
 bath ; but, unlike that ill-fated hunter, he 
 
 never budged from the spot till he had won the 
 
 prize and secured it for his own. She was called 
 
 Trump, and became the progenitress of that 
 
 famous race of terriers which, from that day to 
 
 the present, have been associated with Russell's 
 
 name at home and abroad his able and keen 
 
62 MEMOIR OF 
 
 coadjutors in the hunting-field. An oil-painting 
 of Trump is still in existence, and is, I believe, 
 possessed by H.R.H. the Prince of Wales; 
 but as a copy, executed by a fair and talented 
 artist, is now in my possession, and was ac- 
 knowledged by Russell to be not only an 
 admirable likeness of the original, but equally 
 good as a type of the race in general, I will 
 try, however imperfectly, to describe the por- 
 trait as it now lies before me. 
 
 In the first place, the colour is white with 
 just a patch of dark tan over each eye and ear, 
 while a similar dot, not larger than a penny 
 piece, marks the root of the tail. The coat, 
 which is thick, close, and a trifle wiry, is well 
 calculated to protect the body from wet and 
 cold, but has no affinity with the long, rough 
 jacket of a Scotch terrier. The legs are straight 
 as arrows, the feet perfect ; the loins and con- 
 firmation of the whole frame indicative of hardi- 
 hood and endurance ; while the size and height 
 of the animal may be compared to that of a full- 
 grown vixen fox. 
 
 " I seldom or ever see a real fox-terrier 
 nowadays," said Russell recently to a friend 
 who was inspecting a dog show containing 
 
THE RE V. JOHN R US SELL. 63 
 
 a hundred and fifty entries under that 
 denomination ; " they have so intermingled 
 strange blood with the real article that, if he 
 were not informed, it would puzzle Professor 
 Bell himself to discover what race the so-called 
 fox-terrier belongs to." 
 
 " And pray, how is it managed ? " inquired 
 the friend, eager to profit by Russell's long 
 experience in such matters. " I can well re- 
 member Ruble's and Tom French's Dartmoor 
 terriers, and have myself owned some of that 
 sort worth their weight in gold. True terriers 
 they were, but certainly differing as much from 
 the present show dogs as the wild eglantine 
 differs from a garden rose." 
 
 " The process," replied Russell, " is simply 
 as follows : they begin with a smooth bitch 
 terrier ; then, to obtain a finer skin, an Italian 
 greyhound is selected for her mate. But as 
 the ears of the produce are an eyesore to the 
 connoisseur, a beagle is resorted to, and then 
 little is seen of that unsightly defect in the next 
 generation. Lastly, to complete the mixture, 
 the bulldog is now called on to give the neces- 
 sary courage ; and the composite animals, thus 
 elaborated, become, after due selection, the 
 
64 MEMOIR OF 
 
 sires and dams of the modern fox-terriers. 
 This version of their origin," continued he, " I 
 received from a man well qualified to speak on 
 the subject." 
 
 The bulldog blood thus infused imparts 
 courage, it is true, to the so-called terrier ; he 
 is matchless at killing any number of rats in a 
 given time ; will fight any dog of his weight in 
 a Westminster pit ; draw a badger heavier than 
 himself out of his long box ; and turn up a tom- 
 cat possessed even of ten lives, before poor 
 pussy can utter a wail. But the ferocity of 
 that blood is in reality ill suited nay, is fatal 
 to fox-hunting purposes ; for a terrier that goes 
 to ground and fastens on his fox, as one so 
 bred will do, is far more likely to spoil sport 
 than promote it ; he goes in to kill, not to bolt, 
 the object of his attack. 
 
 Besides, such animals, if more than one slip 
 into a fox-earth, are too apt to forget the game, 
 and fight each other, the death of one being 
 occasionally the result of such encounters. 
 Hence, Russell may well have been proud of 
 the pure pedigree he had so long possessed and 
 so carefully watched over. Tartars they were, 
 and ever have been, beyond all doubt ; going up 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 65 
 
 to their fox in any earth, facing him alternately 
 with hard words and harder nips, until at length 
 he is forced to quit his stronghold, and trust to 
 the open for better security. 
 
 A fox thus bolted is rarely a pin the worse 
 for the skirmish ; he has had fair play given 
 him, and instead of being half strangled, is fit 
 to flee for his life. The hounds, too, have their 
 chance, and the field are not baulked of their 
 expected run. 
 
 Russell's country is technically known as a 
 hollow one ; that is, a country in which rocky 
 fastnesses and earths, excavated by badgers, 
 abound in every direction. Consequently, on 
 every hunting day a terrier or two invariably 
 accompanied him to the field ; and certainly no 
 general ever depended with more trust on the 
 services of an aide-de-camp than he on those of 
 his terriers. If in chase they could not always 
 live with the pack, still they stuck to the line, 
 and were sure to be there or thereabouts when 
 they were wanted, if the hounds threw up even 
 for a minute. 
 
 " I like them to throw their tongue freely 
 when face to face with their enemy," said 
 Russell one day, as he stood listening to his 
 
 5 
 
66 MEMOIR OF 
 
 famous dog Tip, marking energetically in a 
 .long drain some six feet below the surface ; 
 "you know then where they are, and what 
 they're about." 
 
 The late Earl Fitzhardinge, one of the 
 finest sportsmen of his day, was wont to give a 
 very similar reason for mounting his whips on 
 confirmed roarers. 
 
 . ".' " I like to know where the beggars are," he 
 would say ; " for, with the bagpipes going, I can 
 hear, if I don't see them, in the densest cover." 
 
 Entered early, and only at fox, Russell's ter- 
 riers were as steady from riot as the staunchest 
 of his hounds ; so that, running together with 
 them, and never passing over an earth without 
 drawing it, they gave a fox, whether above 
 ground or below it, but a poor chance of not 
 being found, either by one or the other. A 
 squeak from a terrier was the sure signal of a 
 find, and there was not a hound in the pack 
 that would not fly to it, as eagerly as to 
 Russell's horn, or his own wild and marvellous 
 scream. 
 
 This steadiness from riot was, of course, 
 the result of early education on one object the 
 fox ; nor did Russell consider it needful to 
 
THE RE V. JOHN RUSSELL. 67 
 
 train his terriers by progressive steps, according 
 to the plan adopted by Dandie Dinmont. 
 
 " A bonny terrier that, sir ; and a fell chiel 
 at the vermin, I warrant him that is, if he's 
 been weel entered, for it a' lies in that." 
 
 " Really, sir," said Brown, "his education 
 has been somewhat neglected, and his chief 
 property is being a pleasant companion." 
 
 " Ay, sir ! that's a pity, begging your pardon 
 it's a great pity, that beast or body, educa- 
 tion should aye be minded. I have six terriers 
 at home ; forbye twa couple of slow hounds, 
 five grews, and a wheen other dogs. There's 
 Auld Pepper and Auld Mustard, and Young 
 Pepper and Young Mustard, and Little Pepper 
 and Little Mustard. I had them a' regularly 
 entered, first wi' rottens, then wi' stots or 
 weasels, and then wi 5 the tods and brocks ; and 
 now they fear nothing that ever cam' wi' a 
 hairy skin on't." 
 
 A hundred anecdotes might be related of 
 the wondrous sagacity displayed in chase by 
 Russell's terriers ; but as Tip's name has been 
 already mentioned, one of his many feats will 
 suffice to show, not merely the large amount of 
 instinctive faculty, but the almost reasoning 
 
68 MEMOIR OF 
 
 power with which that dog was endowed. 
 Russell himself told me the story, as, some 
 thirty years ago, irr going to cover, he drew my 
 attention to a deep combe not far from Lidcote 
 Hall, the seat of Sir Hugh and the birthplace 
 of poor Amy Robsart. 
 
 " Do you see," he said, " that dark patch of 
 hanging gorse, hemmed in on the northern side 
 by yonder knoll ? Well, I've seen many a good 
 run from that sheltered nook. On one occa- 
 sion, however, I had found a fox which, in spite 
 of a trimming scent, contrived to beat us by 
 reaching Gray's Holts and going to ground 
 before we could catch him. Now those earths 
 are fathomless and interminable as the Cata- 
 combs of St. Calixtus. They are so called 
 ' Gray ' from the old Devonshire name signify- 
 ing a badger, a number of those animals having 
 long occupied that spot. Consequently such a 
 fortress once gained is not easily to be stormed, 
 even by Tip or the stoutest foe. 
 
 " Again, we found that fox a second time ; 
 and now, while the hounds were in close pursuit 
 and driving hard, to my infinite surprise I saw 
 Tip going off at full speed in quite a different 
 direction. 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 69 
 
 " ' He's off, sir, to Gray's Holts ; I know he 
 is,' shouted Jack Yelland, the whip, as he called 
 my attention to the line of country the dog was 
 then taking. 
 
 " That proved to be the case. The fox had 
 scarcely been ten minutes on foot when the dog, 
 either by instinct or, as I believe, by some power 
 akin to reason, putting two and two together, 
 came to the conclusion that the real object of 
 the fox was to gain Gray's Holts, although the 
 hounds were by no means pointing in that 
 direction. It was exactly as if the dog had 
 said to himself: 'No, no! You're the same 
 fox, I know, that gave us the slip once before ; 
 but you're not going to play us that trick again.' 
 
 " Tip's deduction was accurately correct ; for 
 the fox, after a turn or two in cover, put his 
 nose directly for Gray's Holts ; hoping, beyond 
 a doubt, to gain that city of refuge once more, 
 and then to whisk his brush in the face of his 
 foes. But in this manoeuvre he was fairly out- 
 generalled by the dog's tactics. Tip had taken 
 the short cut the chord of the arc and, as the 
 hounds raced by at some distance off, there I 
 saw him," continued Russell, " dancing about on 
 Gray's Holts, throwing his tongue frantically, 
 
70 MEMOIR OF 
 
 and doing his utmost, by noise and gesture, to 
 scare away the fox from approaching the earths. 
 
 " Perfect success crowned the manoeuvre : 
 the fox, not daring to face the lion in his path, 
 gave the spot a wide berth ; while the hounds, 
 carrying a fine head, passed on to the heather, and 
 after a clinking run killed him on the open moor." 
 
 Tip scarcely ever missed a day for several 
 seasons, and never appeared fatigued, though 
 he occasionally went from fifteen to twenty 
 miles to cover. He died at last from asthma in 
 the Chorley earths ; Russell having dug up to 
 him and the fox in half an hour ; but, to his 
 master's great grief, the poor old dog was quite 
 dead. 
 
 Russell looked upon his terriers as his fire- 
 side friends \hepenates of his home ; nor was 
 he ever happier than when to some congenial 
 spirit he was recording the service they had 
 done him in bygone days ; and vast indeed was 
 the store from which he drew so many interest- 
 ing facts connected with their history. 
 
 One peculiarity of Tip's, however, must not 
 be omitted : on a hunting morning no man on 
 earth could catch him, after he had once seen 
 Russell with his top-boots on. 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 71 
 
 Nettle, too, a prodigy of courage and 
 sagacity, would follow no one but her master ; 
 and not even him, except the hounds were at 
 his heels ; knowing full well that her services 
 were only required in connection with the hunt- 
 ing-field. 
 
 Then there was the one-eyed Nelson, a 
 genius in his way ; and, in point of valour, a 
 worthy namesake of England's immortal hero. ' 
 Russell had run a fox to ground near Tetcott, 
 the seat of Sir William Molesworth ; but tiers 
 of passages, one under the other, rendered the 
 earth so perfect a honeycomb that the terriers 
 were soon puzzled, nor did the diggers know 
 what line to follow ; there was scent everywhere. 
 Nelson at length came out, and at some distance 
 off commenced digging eagerly at the green- 
 sward : " Here's the fox," said Russell, " under 
 Nelson's nose, or I'll forfeit my head." The 
 dog went in again, and marking hard and sharp, 
 under that very spot, the men broke ground 
 and speedily came upon the fox. Russell then, 
 with his arm bared, drew him forth ; and setting 
 him on his legs, treated his field to as merry a 
 ten minutes over that wild country, as man's 
 heart could ever wish to enjoy. 
 
72 MEMOIR OF 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 Is Ordained, and Licensed to his First Curacy Keeps Otter- 
 hounds at South Molton, and Hunts with Mr. Froude 
 
 Anecdotes of that Gentleman and Dr. Phtllpotts, the late 
 Bishop of Exeter. 
 
 HAVING resided the necessary number of terms 
 required by the University, Russell entered the 
 Schools for his final examination, declaring, as 
 he crossed the awful Quadrangle, that he felt at 
 that moment " very like Atlas, with a world of 
 weight on his shoulders." However that might 
 be, the stock of erudition he had acquired at 
 Tiverton stood him again in good stead, and 
 enabled him, with a very small amount of pre- 
 vious preparation, to sustain the ordeal bravely. 
 His ambition did not prompt him to go up for 
 honours, nor did his name appear in the class 
 list ; but, having satisfied the examiners and 
 obtained his pass paper, he turned his back on 
 the Bodleian Library with a grateful and joyous 
 heart. 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 73 
 
 That night, in accordance with an old Uni- 
 versity custom, the happy event was celebrated 
 with a grand supper ; and if, during the orgies 
 that followed, the toast of fox-hunting, given 
 with nine times nine and three cheers more, did 
 not effectually wake up the Dons, not only of 
 Exeter, but of Lincoln and Jesus, they, too, 
 must have swallowed a magnum of port, or they 
 never could have slept through such a din. 
 
 Once more, before he quits the University, 
 but this time with a light and elastic step, if not 
 " with pride in his port," he crossed that same 
 Quadrangle, where 
 
 " Bacon's mansion trembles o'er his head," 
 
 to put on his Bachelor's gown ; and being 
 soon afterwards nominated by the Rev. W. B. 
 Stawell to the curacy of George Nympton a 
 rural parish, with a sparse population, near 
 South Molton he was ordained a deacon in 
 1819, and priest in the following year. George 
 Pelham, then Bishop of Exeter, performed the 
 ceremony, in the Chapel Royal, London, where, 
 notwithstanding the long double journeys by 
 coach, and the expenses incidental thereto a 
 serious tax on a salary of ^60 a year the 
 
74 MEMOIR OF 
 
 young candidate was summoned to attend on 
 each occasion. 
 
 " The railway between Exeter and London 
 has been a great boon to me," said the late 
 Bishop of Exeter to his son, Charles Phillpotts, 
 "for by it not only do I save time, but I can 
 now travel to town with the utmost comfort for 
 a $ note ; whereas formerly, by sleeping a 
 night in Bath, and posting it the whole way, it 
 cost me ^50, and much fatigue on every 
 journey." 
 
 That still more primitive Churchman, the 
 judicious Hooker, must have fared far worse 
 than either of his clerical brethren, when he 
 undertook a journey on foot from Oxford to 
 Exeter, taking Salisbury on his way, to see his 
 friend and patron, the good Bishop Jewel. 
 The story is so quaintly told by that genial 
 old fisherman, I zaak Walton, that I am tempted 
 to quote the passage verbatim : 
 
 "At the bishop's parting with him, the 
 bishop gave him good counsel and his benedic- 
 tion, but forgot to give him money ; which when 
 the bishop had considered, he sent a servant in 
 all haste to call Richard back to him ; and at 
 Richard's return, the bishop said to him, 
 
THE RE V. JOHN R US SELL. 7 5 
 
 ' Richard, I sent for you back to lend you a 
 horse, which hath carried me many a mile, and 
 I thank God, with much ease ; ' and presently 
 delivered into his hand a walking-staff, with 
 which he professed he had travelled through 
 many parts of Germany. And he said, ' Richard, 
 I do not give, but lend you my horse ; be sure 
 you be honest, and bring my horse back to me 
 at your return this way to Oxford. And I do 
 now give you ten groats to bear your charges 
 to Exeter ; and here is ten groats more, which 
 I charge you to deliver to your mother, and tell 
 her I send her a bishop's benediction with it, and 
 beg the continuance of her prayers for me. And 
 if you bring my horse back to me, I will give 
 you ten groats more, to carry you on foot to the 
 college ; and so, God bless you, good Richard.' ' 
 That Russell entered on the work of the 
 ministry with a due sense of the sacred office 
 and his own responsibility, will no doubt be 
 charitably questioned by many, who have only 
 heard of his fame in the hunting-field. But, if 
 an ever-earnest readiness to visit the sick and 
 world-weary ; to administer consolation to all who 
 needed it ; to relieve the wants of his poorer 
 brethren, however poor himself; to preach God's 
 
76 MEMOIR OF 
 
 Word with the fervour, if not the eloquence, of 
 a Bourdaloue ; to plead in many a neighbouring 
 pulpit, whenever invited to do so, the cause of 
 charitable institutions, the funds of which never 
 failed to derive substantial aid from his advocacy 
 during a period of fifty years if such things be 
 of good report, and carry any weight, no human 
 being can say of him though he would be the 
 first to say it of himself that his mission as a 
 Christian minister had been altogether that of 
 an unprofitable servant. 
 
 It was on the i/j-th July, 1877, that Mr. 
 Russell, verging on his 82nd year, received a 
 letter from the Rev. A. E. Seymour, the vicar 
 of Barnstaple, inviting him to come over and 
 help him with a charity sermon, adding, " Mr. 
 Wallas (the late vicar) tells me you preached 
 for the Blue-Coat School in this town fifty years 
 ago, and thinks you would be willing to do so 
 again next September. This I hope may be 
 the case, and I know that many of my parish- 
 ioners are hoping so too." 
 
 Mr. Wallas also informs him that " the re- 
 ceipts on that occasion were more than they 
 have ever been since, except once, when the 
 late Bishop Phillpotts preached ; and then his 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 77 
 
 lordship's collection only exceeded yours by a 
 few shillings." 
 
 That gifted bishop, it will be remembered, 
 was second to no man of his day in point of 
 powerful reasoning and persuasive eloquence ; 
 he had, too, the advantage of being a bishop 
 a dignitary formerly so seldom seen in those 
 parts that the country people, according to 
 Grose, in their eagerness to catch sight of him, 
 left their milk-pans on the fire till the cream 
 was " smitched," or, perhaps, burned ; and 
 hence the proverb, " The bishop has put his 
 foot in it." 
 
 The public, doubtless, no longer extend to 
 the clergy addicted to field sports the same 
 toleration they were wont to show them in 
 former times. Those times have, indeed, 
 undergone a change ; but, with latitudinarian- 
 ism, if not infidelity, rampant on one side, and 
 Ritualism on the other, sapping the very foun- 
 dations of our noble Protestant Church, and 
 creating a widespread, menacing cry for its dis- 
 establishment, it may well be doubted if either 
 the cause of pure religion or the social welfare 
 of the country is likely to be benefited by 
 recent changes. 
 
78 MEMOIR OF 
 
 For instance, there are clergymen amongst 
 us in the present day notoriously taking the 
 pay of one Church and doing the work of an- 
 other. Members they are of a secret society 
 Jesuits, it may be, in disguise who, with 
 " The Priest in Absolution " in one hand, and 
 a manual " for the young " in the other, are in- 
 culcating the necessity of confession on chil- 
 dren at the tender age of six or six and a half 
 years ; thus soiling the infant mind with the 
 foulest suggestions, outraging the first instincts 
 of English nature, and, as Archbishop Tait 
 said, " conspiring " against the doctrine, disci- 
 pline, and practice of our Reformed Church. 
 
 The hunting parson is, at least, no " con- 
 spirator " ; and if he stand true to the colours 
 under which he enlisted, conscientiously endea- 
 vouring to do his duty so far as light is given 
 him to do it, who shall cast a stone at him for 
 accepting the exhilarating and innocent recrea- 
 tion which Nature has given him a taste for, 
 and which the charms of the country invite him 
 to enjoy ? 
 
 The truth is, the spirit of the Pharisee is 
 too apt to warp not only our judgment but our 
 charity ; that of the writer, it may be, on the 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 79 
 
 subject of enforced confession, and certainly 
 that of the public on the hunting parson. It is 
 a common fault with men, as Butler quaintly 
 says, to 
 
 " Compound for sins they are inclined to, 
 By damning those they have no mind to." 
 
 If hunting in itself be no sin, then it is an 
 innocent pastime ; and if so, why, if their sacred 
 duties be duly fulfilled, should clergymen be 
 denied its enjoyment ? Is it not an act of 
 tyranny and asceticism to say to them, " You 
 are free to boat, shoot, fish, play cricket or 
 lawn-tennis, and ride but not with hounds ; 
 no, that is a recreation you shall not share with 
 your fellow men ? " 
 
 But the French proverb which says, " Qui 
 s excuse s accuse" must not be forgotten ; and 
 Russell himself would have been the last to 
 admit the need of apology on such a point. He 
 would have said what an old country clergyman, 
 who had been scurrilously attacked for his love 
 of the chase, said before him : " I only wish my 
 hours of recreation had all been spent as hap- 
 pily and as innocently as in the hunting field ; 
 but point out to me the moral turpitude of hunt- 
 ing, and I'll never follow a hound again." 
 
So MEMOIR OF 
 
 To be planted as a curate on 60 a year at 
 George Nympton, and to vegetate like a cab- 
 bage among a scanty population, engaged chiefly 
 in agricultural labour ; to pass his days without 
 one out-of-door occupation beyond that of pay- 
 ing an occasional visit to a suffering cottager or 
 a busy farmer ; to endure the solitude of an 
 Eremite, compared with the lively, social scene 
 he had so recently quitted, was a state of exist- 
 ence so little in accordance with the stirring 
 aspirations of Russell's mind, that the want of 
 " something to do" became almost torture to 
 him. 
 
 Against books requiring close study his 
 whole nature rebelled ; they had too long been 
 his bane both at school and at college ; and 
 rather than be forced to read, he would almost 
 have endured the pains of purgatory. 
 
 The God of Nature would surely never 
 have given him that innate love for a sylvan 
 life which possessed him even on entering the 
 world ; nor would He have blessed him with 
 those eagle wings which have enabled him so 
 long to enjoy it, if he had been intended for a 
 recluse or a mere book-worm ; for, as well 
 might the spots of the bearded pard be ex- 
 
THE RE F. JOHN RUSSELL. 8 1 
 
 punged, as that instinct blotted out from 
 Russell's nature. 
 
 He had been but a short time in harness at 
 George Nympton when he was required by his 
 rector, who was also the incumbent of South 
 Molton, to undertake the weekly duty of that 
 parish besides that of his own. With this re- 
 quest he readily complied ; and settling at South 
 Molton, that being a convenient centre for his 
 double work, he fulfilled the duties of both 
 parishes for a considerable period ; and this, 
 too, with no little amount of additional labour, 
 but without additional pay. 
 
 Nevertheless, had the sphere of his duty 
 been quadrupled, the parochial work alone 
 would still have been utterly insufficient to 
 supply a man of Russell's powers with full 
 occupation of body and mind. The early 
 habits of his life, his wondrous energy, his 
 muscular frame, the strength and endurance of 
 which no fatigue seemed capable of subduing ; 
 and, above all, that innate fire his love, or, to 
 call it by its right name, his passion for the 
 chase combined irresistibly to suggest a 
 stronger exercise than any he could find from 
 the due fulfilment of parochial labour, however 
 
82 MEMOIR OP 
 
 great that might be. So to hounds he turned 
 the summit to him of earthly enjoyment and 
 manly recreation. 
 
 To hunt the otter, of all beasts of venerie 
 the least known and most inscrutable, was his 
 first effort ; and, for that purpose, a scratch lot of 
 five or six couple of hounds were soon gathered 
 from his neighbouring friends. 
 
 If, in adopting that particular recreation, his 
 object were to keep his muscles in strong play, 
 and at the same time to delight his eye with 
 the beauties of Nature, so profusely lavished on 
 the meads, the moors, and the combes of that 
 picturesque country, he could scarcely have 
 made a better choice. But, in all likelihood, 
 the low condition of his exchequer, coupled 
 with that innate impulse which prompted him 
 to long for the company of hounds at all sea- 
 sons of the year, had far more to do with it 
 than a craving for mere bodily exercise or a 
 love of scenery. 
 
 The hounds, it has been said, were a 
 " scratch lot," and Russell, even then a some- 
 what experienced amateur, must have felt as 
 little proud of them as Jack Falstaff did of the 
 ragged scarecrows before whom he marched so 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 83 
 
 unwillingly into the town of Coventry. How- 
 ever, if they had only fulfilled the adage of 
 " handsome is that handsome does,' 5 he cer- 
 tainly would have been the last man to find 
 fault with any amount of mere outward defects 
 in size, shape, or comeliness of form. 
 
 But not so ; there was not a hound amongst 
 them that would touch a trail ; not one that 
 would come to a mark and give him the slightest 
 clue to the whereabouts of the hidden game ; 
 indeed, both his patience and energy were well- 
 nigh exhausted by the continuous difficulty of 
 holding them on a stream. Wander away they 
 would, into every brake and cover on his line of 
 march ; and if perchance a fox or a hare could 
 be raked up, from that moment farewell to the 
 rioters and the chance of aquatic sport for the 
 rest of the day. 
 
 " I walked three thousand miles," said Rus- 
 sell (the country-people must have taken him 
 for Van Wodenblock), " without finding an 
 otter ; and although I must have passed over 
 scores, I might as well have searched for a 
 moose-deer." 
 
 In failing, however, to make the acquaint- 
 ance of that animal, his long tramps in quest of 
 
84 MEMOIR OF 
 
 him did not, in one respect, prove altogether 
 profitless ; for then it was he acquired that rare 
 knowledge of his country which ever since has 
 remained, like an Ordnance map, imprinted on 
 his memory. In after years, on many a starless 
 night, with many a long mile between him and 
 his kennels, through ravines dark as Erebus, 
 through fords flooded by storms, over the path- 
 less moor, by bog, fell, and precipice, that know- 
 ledge did him good service, bringing him always, 
 like the instinct of the carrier pigeon, safely to 
 his home. 
 
 In clinging to the course of the rivers a 
 point of the first necessity in drawing for an 
 otter the scenery that met Russell's eye on 
 every side must have mitigated, to some little 
 extent, the daily chagrin he could not help 
 feeling at not being able to find the game to 
 blood his hounds. The farmers, too, that fol- 
 lowed him, not getting their sport, would be 
 sure to express their incredulity in the very 
 existence of the animal ; and the assurance that 
 " they had never seed no sich varmint up their 
 bottoms " must have frequently grated on his 
 ears during that long and profitless walk of three 
 thousand miles. 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 85 
 
 Still, he was walking through an Arcadia. 
 The meads, full of flowers, rivalling " the mosaic 
 of a Swiss meadow ;" the woods and slopes, wild 
 as fancy ever painted them ; the hill-tops, clad 
 with heather, bracken, and golden furze ; the 
 combes, luxuriant with a variety of ferns of 
 exquisite form and beauty, the Queenly Os- 
 munda being among the number ; and, to crown 
 all, even the bogs and brooks, mantling with 
 the forget-me-not, which, by its soft, tur- 
 quoise hue, might lead one to imagine their 
 whole surface was studded with those precious 
 stones. 
 
 Then there was the water-ousel, now dip- 
 ping, and now running in search of its food, 
 even while submerged, among the pebbles and 
 sands of the silvery streams ; and, more beau- 
 tiful still, the lustrous kingfisher, glancing past 
 him like a living emerald on lightning wings. 
 
 These were treats of Nature which proved 
 a perpetual feast to Russell's eye ; but the word 
 " beaten " was not to be found in his vocabulary ; 
 like Robert Bruce, the oftener he was defeated, 
 the stronger grew his will to conquer, and 
 although, as Barbour relates, that monarch 
 was so hotly pursued by John of Lorn, his 
 
86 MEMOIR OF 
 
 inveterate foe, till the echoes of Scotland did 
 actually 
 
 . .. . ring 
 With the bloodhounds that bayed for her fugitive king ;" 
 
 still the Bruce persevered, and did conquer in 
 the end. 
 
 So did Russell ; but in a far more peaceful 
 way. The change in the tide of his affairs took 
 place thus : Mr. John Morth Woolcombe, of 
 Ashbury, near Hatherleigh, kept at that time a 
 fine pack of hounds, averaging twenty-three 
 inches at the shoulder foxhounds, in fact, they 
 were, as high bred as those of Meynell, although 
 it was his pleasure to pursue with them the timid 
 hare only. 
 
 Russell, happening to meet with a farmer 
 who kept hounds in the neighbourhood of 
 Hatherleigh, and hunted indiscriminately fox, 
 hare, and otter, discovered from him that a 
 hound called Racer, drafted from Mr. Wool- 
 combe's pack, had fallen into his hands, and, 
 moreover, that he was either too fast or too 
 mute for his own old-fashioned cry. 
 
 " Now," thought Russell, " here's my oppor- 
 tunity ; Racer must at least know what an otter 
 is, so I'll buy him if I can." 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 87 
 
 " Will you sell the hound ? " inquired he, in 
 an off-hand way. 
 
 " Certainly," said the farmer, " with all my 
 heart ; but I must first ask Mr. Woolcombe's 
 permission to do so." 
 
 That permission being readily granted, Rus- 
 sell paid the farmer a guinea, the price he asked 
 for him ; and, well pleased with his bargain, he 
 brought the hound back with him to South 
 Molton. It turned out, afterwards, however, 
 that Racer had only once before tasted the 
 scent of an otter ; still he loved it dearly, and 
 oft have I heard Russell declare he was the 
 best otter-hound he ever saw. 
 
 Now Racer, as Russell soon found, com- 
 bined in himself the twofold qualities especially 
 required in an otter-hound ; for though mute 
 before the otter was found, he was nevertheless 
 a good trail-hound, and a sound, persevering 
 marker ; the very animal needed to guide and 
 instruct the unscientific corps under Russell's 
 command. So from that day the scratch lot 
 began to understand what manner of beast it 
 was they were required to hunt. 
 
 Their education may be thus described : As 
 soon as Racer hits upon a trail, though he does 
 
MEMOIR OP 
 
 not speak, his action indicates his love of it so 
 strongly that the rest of the pack no longer 
 stray from the stream ; then, as the scent im- 
 proves under the shade of some dark, over- 
 hanging alder, here and there a hound chimes 
 in and backs him up ; till at length, attracted by 
 the eager and persistent mark of their pilot, 
 tearing at the otter's door and announcing him 
 " at home," one and all unite in a wild chorus ; 
 and thus by degrees, after a few such lessons, 
 followed by an occasional find and kill, Russell 
 has the satisfaction of seeing the whole lot 
 changed into a working and useful pack of 
 otter-hounds. 
 
 Hitherto, Russell had himself only seen one 
 otter killed, and that was by Mr. Cooke, of 
 Uplowman, near Tiverton ; but, after Racer 
 became his property, he scored the death of 
 thirty-five right off the reel ; a boon for which 
 every son of Zebedee in that county must have 
 been duly grateful. 
 
 During the six years he kept these otter- 
 hounds in South Molton, none of which were 
 ever kennelled, but found each a welcome home 
 before the fire of an inhabitant, twenty couple 
 at least passed through his hands, not one of 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 89 
 
 which could ever be induced to touch the scent 
 of an otter. 
 
 It is quite clear, however, that Russell did 
 not at first know what age and experience after- 
 wards taught him, namely, that the scent of the 
 otter is not one to which hounds, of their own 
 accord, will naturally stoop ; but he might well 
 have guessed it by the result of that fruitless 
 leg-labour to which he patiently resigned him- 
 self for so long a time. 
 
 It is a curious fact that the veriest cur, the 
 first time he crosses the line of a deer, will drop 
 his nose and carry the scent as instinctively as 
 a blind puppy will hunt for the teat of its dam. 
 It requires, too, as every one knows, but little 
 persuasion to induce hounds to enter at fox and 
 hare ; simply because those animals are their 
 natural prey. But not so with the otter, the 
 scent of which, until he is trained to it, appears 
 to have little or no attraction for the nose of a 
 young hound. Indeed, let a whole pack, how- 
 ever well trained, find an old otter in moderately 
 strong water, and if left entirely to themselves, 
 and man's hand and eye give them no aid, the 
 chances of a kill, except by accident, will in 
 every case be dead against the hounds. 
 
90 MEMOIR OF 
 
 It may fairly be inferred, therefore, from the 
 unreadiness of hounds in first taking- to the 
 scent, as well as from the all but insuperable 
 difficulty of killing the animal without supple- 
 mentary aid, that Nature never intended the 
 otter to be an object of prey for hounds ; and 
 that, in fact, the sport is to them an artificial one 
 from beginning to end. 
 
 Nevertheless the otter is a really wild beast ; 
 his efforts to escape, when put down, are mar- 
 vellously clever ; the hounds become very fond 
 of the scent, and the sport he shows, if given 
 fair play, no pen can adequately describe. But 
 it lasts only for a season of four short months, 
 and it will be asked what, by way of recreation 
 and congenial exercise, did Russell find to do 
 during the other eight of the year ? 
 
 The answer will, of course, be anticipated. 
 He hunted whenever he had the chance of 
 doing so. At that time, and for many years 
 afterwards, a rare pack of hounds were kept in 
 the neighbourhood by the Rev. John Froude, 
 of Knowstone, a man better known, perhaps, in 
 the western counties, for his utter disregard of 
 episcopal, and, indeed, of all human authority, 
 than even for the celebrity of his hounds. With 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 91 
 
 him and his pack, then, Russell managed to 
 hunt on every available occasion ; enjoying to 
 his heart's content both the sport and hospi- 
 tality which Froude never failed to show him, 
 and tiding over the winter season in a very 
 happy way. 
 
 A fine, wild country was that in which the 
 vicar of Knowstone took his pastime; but espe- 
 cially that portion extending towards East and 
 West Anstey and Molland Down ; a land of 
 heath, bracken, and furze, with moors " im- 
 measurably spread " in every direction. Know- 
 stone and South Molton, where Russell then 
 lived, are, more or less, about ten miles apart ; 
 but as now, so then, whenever the hounds met, 
 whether on his side of the country or on the 
 other, neither the most inclement weather nor 
 the longest distance to cover seemed ever to 
 cause him a moment's hesitation. 
 
 In a letter Russell addressed to an old 
 friend, he says : 
 
 " My head-quarters at that time were at 
 South Molton ; and I hunted as many days in 
 every week as my duties would permit with John 
 Froude, the well-known vicar of Knowstone, 
 with whom I was then on very intimate terms. 
 
92 MEMOIR OF 
 
 " His hounds were something out of the 
 common ; bred from the old staghounds light 
 in their colour, and sharp as needles plenty of 
 tongue, but would drive like furies. I have 
 never seen a better or more killing pack in all 
 my long life. He couldn't bear to see a hound 
 put his nose on the ground and ' twiddle his 
 tail.' ' Hang the brute,' he would say to the 
 owner of the hounds, ' and get those that can 
 wind their game when they are thrown off.' 
 
 " Froude was himself a first-rate sportsman; 
 but always acted on the principle of ' kill un, if 
 you can ; you'll never see un again/ 
 
 " I saw him once shoot a hare sitting near 
 a farmhouse where his hounds met on the 
 following day ; and where, of course, they did 
 not find. He hunted on three days of the week, 
 and shot on the others, when he could walk 
 most men off their legs. I never saw him with 
 a rod and line in his hand ; but he was very 
 expert with nets on land or in water. He was 
 the most original man I ever met with. He 
 had an old liver-coloured spaniel called Crack, 
 a wide ranger, but under perfect command. He 
 used to say he could hunt the parish with that 
 dog from the top of the church tower. You 
 
THE RE V. JOHN R US SELL. 93 
 
 could hear his view-halloo for miles ; and his 
 hounds absolutely flew to him when they heard 
 it. Let me add, his hospitality knew no 
 bounds." 
 
 This last tribute to Mr. Froude's memory 
 will remind many a west-countryman of a story 
 which, among the hundred and one related of 
 him, described the reception he is said to have 
 given to his Diocesan, the late Lord Bishop of 
 Exeter. Week after week sundry newspapers 
 had been publishing articles of the most scur- 
 rilous description, headed " Knowstone again ;" 
 the burden of which reflected on Froude's mode 
 of life and the lawless acts perpetrated in that 
 parish. These, of course, never failed to reach 
 the bishop's eye ; consequently the stout-hearted 
 prelate, always a friend to be depended on when 
 his clergy were, as he thought, unfairly assailed, 
 summoned Mr. Froude to appear at the palace, 
 and explain the grave charges thus publicly 
 brought against him. 
 
 But neither did Froude obey the summons, 
 nor would he give the bishop a chance of wig- 
 ging him by attending his visitations ; so, like 
 Mahomet and the mountain, the bishop deter- 
 mined to go to him ; a course which, short of 
 
94 MEMOIR OF 
 
 legal proceedings, was the only one now open 
 to him. 
 
 Accordingly, on a bitter winter's morning, 
 the bishop, conveyed by a post-chaise from 
 Tiverton, arrived at Knowstone vicarage, and 
 having inquired if Mr. Froude were at home, 
 was told he was, on hearing which he entered 
 the house. 
 
 After a short delay in the cold guest-chamber, 
 the bishop was shown into another apartment, 
 where sat Mr. Froude before a comfortable fire, 
 his head muffled in flannel and his voice appa- 
 rently as hoarse as that of a carrion crow. 
 
 " I've come to see you, Mr. Froude," com- 
 menced the bishop, " to inquire if " 
 
 " Oh, yes, my lord ; 'tis cold work, sure 
 enough, travelling over our moors ; but do 'ee 
 take a glass of hot brandy-and-water, 'twill keep 
 off the shivers when nought else will." 
 
 Then, in spite of the bishop's protestations 
 that he. needed no alcohol, especially in the 
 morning, Froude rang the bell and ordered a 
 glass of brandy-and-water to be mixed forthwith, 
 " hot and strong for the bishop." 
 
 Again his lordship positively declined the 
 stimulant, and endeavoured to explain the object 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 95 
 
 of his visit ; but Froude, apparently not hear- 
 ing a word he had uttered, cut him short by 
 saying, " It's my only doctor, my lord, is a drop 
 of brandy ; and if I had but taken it when I 
 got my chill I shouldn't now be as. I be, deaf as 
 a haddock, and nursing this fire like an old 
 
 woman." 
 
 The bishop would hear no more ; but mak- 
 ing him a grave bow, took his leave, entered 
 his carriage, and returned whence he came. In 
 ten minutes from that time, so goes the story, 
 Froude was seen to mount his horse and trot 
 away in company with his hounds. ' 
 
 " I cannot tell how the truth may be ; 
 I say the tale as 'twas said to me." 
 
 Russell, however, who knew Froude's say- 
 ings and doings better than any man living, and 
 was wont, like Yorick, " to set the table on a 
 roar " when throwing his tongue on that lively 
 subject, maintained that if the bishop had in- 
 vaded Froude's domain a dozen times the result 
 would have been precisely the same ; but that 
 he only went once to Knowstone, and then, 
 being admitted for a few minutes, beat a hasty 
 retreat, and escaped from the house much faster 
 than he entered it. 
 
96 MEMOIR OF 
 
 This is the story as Russell told it : 
 
 " The bishop at length was determined to 
 have an interview with Fronde, and as his lord- 
 ship was staying at the time with, I believe, 
 that pattern of a country gentleman, Tom Carew, 
 of Collipriest, he ordered a pair of horses from 
 Cannon and started for Knowstone with that 
 object in view. 
 
 " By some intuition, however, peculiar to 
 himself, Froude suspected that such an event 
 might occur, and at once set to work to frustrate 
 the bishop's design. He stationed a signalman 
 within hail of his house, on the only road lead- 
 ing to it from Tiverton, giving him orders, if he 
 saw a chaise and pair travelling towards the 
 vicarage, to hasten thither and sound the alarm. 
 
 " Accordingly, when the bishop did appear, 
 Froude and his household were not only ap- 
 prised of his approach, but duly prepared for 
 his reception. 
 
 "'Can I see Mr. Froude?' inquired his 
 lordship, in that mild, measured tone which he 
 habitually adopted when he meant to carry his 
 point. * Be good enough to say the Bishop of 
 Exeter wishes to have a few words with him." 
 
 " ' Please to walk in, my lord,' replied the 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 97 
 
 old housekeeper, Jane, who had gone to the 
 door, and would have gone to the stake to serve 
 her master. * Mr. Froude is at home, but is 
 up abed wi'some ailment or other.' 
 
 " * Nothing serious, I hope ? ' said the bishop, 
 taking a seat in the state apartment ; ' and if 
 so, I daresay he would not object to see me at 
 his bedside.' 
 
 " Jane paused for a moment, and then, with 
 some hesitation, replied, * Perhaps not, my lord: 
 leastwise, if you bean't afeered o' going there. 
 'Tis a faver o' some soart, but I can't mind what 
 the doctor calFth it.' 
 
 " The bishop cocked his ear and looked 
 uneasy. ' A fever, did you say ? Rheumatic, 
 perhaps, from exposure to wet ? ' 
 
 " ' No, no ; I've a got that myself bad 
 enough. 'Tis something a deal worse, I reckon/ 
 
 " ' Not scarlet fever, I hope ? ' 
 
 " The housekeeper shook her head despond- 
 ingly. * Worse than that, my lord,' 
 
 " ' Typhus ?' inquired the bishop, no longer 
 able to hide his look of alarm. 
 
 "'Iss, that's it; seem'th to me that's what 
 the doctor ca'd it. 'Tis a whisht job, fai.' 
 
 " The bishop clutched his hat, and with 
 
 7 
 
98 MEMOIR OF 
 
 little ceremony took his departure ; and although 
 he announced his intention of repeating his 
 visit at a more convenient season, he never 
 again set foot in the parish of Knowstone. 
 
 "When the bishop had -fairly disappeared," 
 Russell adds, " Froude put on his long gaiters 
 and went out hunting for the rest of the day." 
 
 " I told ee so, Jack ; I know'd he come," he 
 said to Russell the first time he met him after 
 that event. " But there, he's never likely to 
 come again ; the air of Knowstone's too keen 
 for him, I reckon." 
 
 Though an athlete in intellect, the bishop, 
 according to Russell, was no match for Froude 
 in those minor tactics, the success of which 
 depended on manoeuvre and finesse ; in that 
 line he could have beaten Machiavelli himself. 
 His lordship, it is said, met Froude one day 
 with a greyhound, commonly known in Devon- 
 shire as "a long-dog," walking by his side: 
 " And pray, Mr. Froude," said the bishop, with 
 a courteous, but restrained air, "what manner 
 of dog may you call that ? " 
 
 " Oh ! that's what we call a lang-dog, my 
 lord ; and if yeu was on'y to shak' yeur appern 
 to un, he'd go like a dart." 
 
THE RE V. JOHN R US SELL. 99 
 
 The idea of that dignified and ceremonious 
 prelate shaking his apron, like an old woman, 
 to frighten the dog, is so ludicrous that, if 
 it did not beget even in his eye a twinkle 
 of mirth, he must have struggled hard to 
 restrain it. 
 
 Russell's anecdotes of Froude would fill a 
 volume ; but to produce a tithe of them in these 
 pages would be to give the latter undue pro- 
 minence in the present memoir. Besides, 
 however pointed anecdotes may be if told by a 
 racy tongue like Russell's, still, when written, 
 they are very apt to meet the reader's eye with 
 a lifeless and blunted effect. 
 
 There can be little doubt that the friendship 
 and example of a man like the vicar of Know- 
 stone did not only influence Russell at the very 
 outset of his professional career, but, in all 
 likelihood, biassed the whole course of his after 
 life. To a young man, socially inclined and 
 fond of hunting, the attraction of Froude's 
 company must have been irresistible ; for 
 Froude was witty, original, hospitable ; and, 
 moreover, exercised a kind of mysterious power, 
 such as men of strong will are known to 
 possess, over those with whom he associated. 
 
ico MEMOIR OF 
 
 Above all, he had a crack pack of hounds, and 
 was himself, as Russell described him, a " first- 
 rate sportsman." 
 
 This rare quality, had he possessed no other 
 fascination, would have been alone sufficient to 
 charm Russell's heart ; ay, and to lead him, as 
 it did from that day forth, into a willing and 
 life-long captivity. 
 
THE RE V. JOHN R US SELL. I o i 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 The Teignbridge Cricket Club and the Party at Stover Mr. 
 George Tempter and the " Let-'em-Alones" The "Bold 
 Dragoon? " Nunky" and the Rev. Henry Taylor. 
 
 " Whate'er the stranger's caste or creed, 
 
 Pundit or Papist, saint or sinner ; 
 He found a stable for his steed, 
 And welcome for himself, and dinner." 
 
 WINTHROP PRAED. 
 i 
 
 DURING the next six years of his life, that is, 
 from 1819 to 1825, Russell still continued to 
 reside at South Molton ; doing his work as a 
 curate to the satisfaction of his parishioners ; 
 and, when off duty, rarely missing a day in the 
 winter season, either with the hounds of his at- 
 tractive neighbour, Mr. Froude, of Knowstone, 
 or with the far-famed pack of Mr. Templer, of 
 Stover ; where, come when he would, he was at 
 all times sure to find a hearty welcome and the 
 best of company. 
 
 Those six years may fairly be termed the 
 period of his final apprenticeship in woodcraft ; 
 
102 MEMOIR OF 
 
 for, soon afterwards, we find him in the respon- 
 sible position of an M.F.H., playing, it is true, a 
 somewhat uphill game, but still adhering with 
 unflinching tenacity to that sylvan groove which 
 Nature apparently had formed him to fill, and 
 from which he never deflected throughout the 
 long course of an eventful life. 
 
 During the summer season, however, another 
 out-of-door recreation, besides that of otter- 
 hunting, appears to have provided him, so long 
 as he indulged in it, with strong exercise and a 
 pleasant pastime. It was the game of cricket ; 
 which, although established at Lord's by the 
 Marylebone Club so far back as 1787, had taken 
 many a year to travel into Devonshire, where 
 it is doubtful if it became generally played 
 before 1823 or 1824. The up-and-down char- 
 acter of the country, in which it would be 
 difficult in scores of parishes to find a perfectly 
 level field, might have been some reason for its 
 long-deferred introduction into that county. Be 
 that as it may, there are no records to show 
 that the noble game of cricket became an in- 
 stitution in Devon before the i8th of May, 
 1824; w r hen a club was formally established at 
 Teignbridge ; that locality being admirably 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 103 
 
 adapted for the purpose, the play -ground being 
 level as a die, and conveniently near to the 
 houses of several of its most prominent 
 members. 
 
 Russell attended the first meeting, held in a 
 " linhay " or cowshed, on that occasion; played 
 in the first game ; and, with two of his brothers, 
 was constituted an honorary member of the 
 club on its natal day. But, whatever his quali- 
 fications might have been, it cannot be said that 
 he afterwards became an ardent cricketer ; nor 
 is it related of him by his contemporaries that 
 he ever distinguished himself, either as a good 
 " field," batsman, or bowler. His thoughts, in 
 fact, were still on hounds intent ; the ruling 
 passion had sole possession of him, and he could 
 no more have devoted his energy to cricket 
 than to a game of marbles. 
 
 The Rev. Henry Taylor, of West Ogwell, 
 the Rev. John Templer and his elder brother, 
 Mr. George Templer, of Stover, were members; 
 the former having been chosen as president, 
 and the latter as vice-president of the newly- 
 formed Club. Mr. Templer, a gentleman of 
 brilliant intellect and most charming manner, 
 had for some time previously established at 
 
104 MEMOIR OF 
 
 Stover a pack of dwarf fox-hounds, averaging 
 nineteen inches at the shoulders, with which he 
 hunted, when he had the luck to find him, the 
 real wild article ; but, when a blank was appre- 
 hended, a bagman, which, always at hand, was 
 turned down in view of the hounds. 
 
 The system was a novel one, hitherto un- 
 practised in this or any other country ; but the 
 sport shown and the hard riding it gave rise to, 
 owing to the habit of saving the fox alive, when 
 the hounds had fairly run up to him, will be 
 remembered in the county so long as Heytor 
 Rock looks down on any one survivor of Temp- 
 ler's friends. At least a score of foxes were 
 kept within two spacious yards expressly for 
 this purpose ; and as they were attached, each 
 one to its separate coop, by a long chain re- 
 volving on a swivel, they were able to take 
 plenty of exercise and keep themselves in good 
 wind ; the gallop of the animals, like that of a 
 horse in a circus, being sometimes accelerated 
 by a light tandem-whip handled by a groom. 
 Of the stoutness of one, yclept the " Bold Dra- 
 goon," I have heard both Templer and Taylor 
 relate some stirring tales : he had been turned 
 out thirty-six times, had generally led them a 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 105 
 
 long dance, and never failed to enjoy a fresh 
 rabbit for supper on safely returning to his 
 kennel home. 
 
 When Mr. Templer parted with his pack, 
 in 1826, a lot of the larger hounds went to the 
 Rev. H. F. Yeatman, of Stock House, Dorset- 
 shire ; while the lesser, including the far-famed 
 " Let-'em-alones " (the bag-fox pack), were dis- 
 persed throughout the country ; Sir Henry 
 Carew, Mr. Hammett Drake, Mr. Worth, of 
 Worth, Mr. Hole, of Georgeham, and others, 
 having purchased the whole of them in separate 
 lots. From these precious relics, as they were 
 speedily discovered to be, many couples were 
 subsequently secured and brought together 
 by the united efforts of Russell and his co- 
 adjutor, Mr. Arthur Harris, of Hayne ; and 
 formed the nucleus of that famous pack which 
 showed such unexampled sport over the Tetcott 
 and Pencarrow countries in 1828 30; a wild 
 moorland district extending from Torrington to 
 Bodmin, in Cornwall, unquestionably the finest 
 hunting-ground in the West of England. 
 
 Thirty odd years have drifted away on the 
 stream of time since the genial and big-hearted 
 George Templer was carried to his last ances- 
 
106 MEMOIR OF 
 
 tral home at Teigngrace ; but it will interest 
 the reader to know something more of the man 
 who is acknowledged to have been Russell's 
 chief Gamaliel, and whose hunting-horn, as Mr. 
 Harris tells us, "passed so worthily to his apt 
 and favourite pupil." 
 
 Templer's hospitality at Stover literally 
 knew no bounds. The company, too, he se- 
 lected for his guests were for the most part 
 men of standing in the county Worthies of 
 Devon the bare fact of their being sportsmen, 
 as well as gentlemen, being the "open sesame" 
 to Templer's heart. 
 
 "A Party at Stover in 1823," written in 
 elegant verse by the gifted host, includes, for 
 instance, the names of no less than four guests 
 who were subsequently Masters of Foxhounds 
 in his own or the adjoining county of Cornwall : 
 namely, those of Sir William Salusbury Tre- 
 lawny ; Mr. John King, of Fowelscombe ; Mr. 
 John Crocker Bulteel, of Flete, Russell's first 
 antagonist at Plympton School ; and that of 
 John Russell, then, however, a Master of Otter- 
 hounds only. 
 
 Sitting at Templer's ample board, it may 
 well be imagined how Russell, if no wine-bibber, 
 
THE RE V. JOHN RUSSELL. 107 
 
 still drank in and enjoyed, to his heart's con- 
 tent, those racy draughts of hunting lore, of 
 which his host possessed so copious a supply ; 
 and which he (Russell) profited by so largely in 
 after years. He must have felt, as he would 
 himself have said, " up to his hocks in clover" 
 among such company. 
 
 Templer's power over fox-hounds, governed 
 more by kindness than the lash, delighted his 
 eyes ; so unique was the system of discipline 
 and control with which they were managed, 
 even in the presence of a fox. " His mode of 
 tuition," writes Mr. Harris, " was so perfect 
 that each hound comprehended every inflexion 
 of his voice ; every note of his horn was intelli- 
 gible to them, and conveyed a full meaning ; 
 and to the wave of his hand an instant obedi- 
 ence was given that required neither rate nor 
 sterner discipline to urge. He was ably 
 seconded by his friends and assistants, the late 
 Mr. Harry Taylor and Mr. Russell ; and per- 
 haps there never was exhibited a greater per- 
 fection of hunting, of scientific control over 
 hounds, and of skill in eliciting their utmost 
 powers of chase and hunting, than was afforded 
 by the establishment of Stover, under the 
 
io8 MEMOIR OF 
 
 superintendence of this memorable trium- 
 virate." 
 
 When a bagman was about to be turned 
 out it was always done in view of the hounds, 
 Templer standing among them with his hunt- 
 ing-watch open in hand ; nor would a hound 
 attempt to stir till fair law had been allowed, 
 and the last word of the signal, " One, two, 
 away ! " bid them to the chase. A hound, 
 called " Guardsman," had become so very 
 knowing at the work that, instead of looking 
 after the fox, he kept his eye fixed on the 
 watch ; and, the moment he saw the case 
 closed, away he went, like an arrow from a 
 bow. 
 
 The business then was to save the fox alive ; 
 and, whether he were a wild fox or a bagman, 
 such was the hard riding and such the obedience 
 of the hounds to a rate, that, nine times out of 
 ten, the animal was picked up before them, with- 
 out a hair of his skin being broken. Blood was 
 a finale to which, at home, they were never 
 treated, and yet a harder-driving lot never 
 entered a cover. But as Nimrod, after his visit 
 at Stover, tells us, " To show that Mr. 
 Templer's hounds can kill foxes when suffered 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 109 
 
 to do so, it may not be amiss to mention that 
 whilst they were at North Molton, for the pur- 
 pose of hunting alternate days with Mr. Fel- 
 lowes's or Sir Arthur Chichester's hounds, at the 
 Chumleigh Club, they killed three brace of foxes 
 in four days." 
 
 And those foxes, be it observed, were the 
 wild moorland tartars, bred in the rough country 
 surrounding Exmoor. 
 
 Under a tutor, then, so well qualified to in- 
 struct him in the countless mysteries of the 
 " noble science," it would, indeed, have been a 
 wonder if Russell, so fashioned by Nature for 
 the chase, had not fulfilled to the utmost the 
 expectations with which he was then credited by 
 so able and experienced a master. That he did 
 not disappoint him, the world will bear strong 
 witness in the pupil's favour. 
 
 Nimrod, who was fortunate in meeting both 
 the Rev. Henry Taylor and Russell at Stover, 
 has left us the following brief sketch of those two 
 men : 
 
 " There is one gentleman who is a constant 
 attendant on Mr. Templer's hounds, a very fine 
 horseman over a country, and report says, quite 
 the clipper of the West. This is the Rev. 
 
1 10 MEMOIR OF 
 
 Henry Taylor. There is another gentleman of 
 the same cloth, the Rev. John Russell (but much 
 better known by the name of ' Jack Russell '), 
 who, though he resides about thirty miles from 
 him, hunts a good deal with Mr. Templer, and 
 who also stands high among the Devonshire 
 bruisers. This gentleman finds hunting so con- 
 ducive to his health, that with stag-hounds, fox- 
 hounds, harriers, and otter-hounds, he contrives 
 to enjoy it all the year round. The last-men- 
 tioned pack are kept by himself; and he has 
 killed the almost incredible number of twenty- 
 five otters in the last two summers, for which he 
 should receive the thanks of the fish ! Each of 
 these gentlemen spent the evening with us at 
 Mr. Templer's, and added much to its con- 
 viviality and pleasure." 
 
 Where all were welcome, it would be almost 
 invidious to single out one as the most favoured 
 and constant guest of the Stover party ; but, in 
 truth, Henry Taylor of Ogwell the boy known 
 at Eton as Ninth Harry was that man. But 
 for him, on his famous horse Nunky, the career 
 of the " Bold Dragoon " would have been cut 
 short very early in the day, and his dark hide 
 converted into " a hundred tatters of brown : " 
 
THE RE F. JOHN RUSSELL. 1 1 1 
 
 for a finer horseman or a nobler man never 
 followed a hound ; and he it was who almost 
 invariably contrived to save the life of that 
 gallant fox. 
 
 On one occasion, however, both he and 
 Nunky nearly came to serious grief, and nar- 
 rowly escaped with their lives. The anecdote 
 was first told me by Mr. George Templer, and 
 afterwards confirmed by Taylor himself; whose 
 natural modesty and true nobility of soul, though 
 I had the honour of knowing him intimately for 
 nearly a quarter of a century, would never per- 
 mit him to tell me a tale in which he himself 
 figured as the hero. 
 
 The " Bold Dragoon " had been turned out 
 in the Vale of Teigngrace ; and crossing the 
 River Teign, then flooded by heavy rains, was 
 leading the pack at a rattling pace in the direc- 
 tion of Ugbrook Park, when the whole field 
 were brought to a sudden check at sight of the 
 " brimming river." 
 
 The ford, known to a few, was now invisible, 
 and the only bridge, more than a mile away, 
 seemed too far to be available. What then was 
 to be done ? The fate of the " Bold Dragoon " 
 was a certainty, if there were no one up to rate 
 
ii2 MEMOIR OF 
 
 the hounds : and his Colossus mare was scarcely 
 more valued by Templer than that fox. 
 
 "Go for Jew's bridge," shouted a cautious 
 member of the hunt; "that's our only chance 
 for catching the hounds : " and away went the 
 field helter-skelter, in that direction ; every man 
 of them except Taylor. 
 
 Seeing a flight of rails close to the river 
 bank, and concluding they were placed there to 
 prevent cattle from crossing the ford, Taylor 
 rode his horse straight at them, thinking to land 
 him, perhaps, up to his girths on dropping into 
 the stream. But, alas ! the spot proved to be 
 one of the deepest pools in the Teign river : the 
 horse and rider disappeared ; but the latter, 
 having been an expert swimmer at Eton, soon 
 came to the surface, and, striking out vigor- 
 ously, gained the opposite bank in safety. But 
 now, great was his dismay on looking round to 
 find that Nunky was nowhere to be seen ; not a 
 wave nor a gurgle indicated his whereabouts 
 below ; and, for some seconds, Taylor felt assured 
 the horse had been stunned, and had gone down 
 like a stone to the bottom. 
 
 Happily he was wrong ; as the hoofs first, 
 and then the legs, of the animal gradually 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 1 13 
 
 appeared above water ; and then, as the body 
 grounded about twenty yards below on the 
 gravelly ford, which Taylor had failed to hit, 
 he discovered that his horse's fore -legs had 
 been caught by the reins, and that every time he 
 struck out he jerked his own head under water. 
 
 To plunge again into the whirling stream, to 
 unclasp his knife, cut the reins, and take a pull 
 at Nunky's head, was the work of a second, 
 when the brave beast jumped on his legs, and 
 after a few sobs to clear out his pipes, Taylor 
 vaulted into the saddle and dashed off in pur- 
 suit of the hounds. 
 
 A fever he had caught at Eton had utterly 
 destroyed the hair of his head, and consequently 
 he always wore a sandy-coloured wig, made by 
 that eminent artist, Mr. Piper, of Exeter. His wig 
 and hat, however, were carried to sea, while he 
 was discovered scudding away under bare poles, 
 
 " Taking hedges for billows and mountains for seas ; " 
 
 nor, like the moss-trooper of old, did he slacken 
 his rein or " stint to ride," till he had picked up 
 the fox and bagged him alive. 
 
 I drew the story out of the dear old fellow 
 over a bottle of port wine in his sanctum at 
 
 South Poole, when he added, " It's quite true, 
 
 8 
 
ii 4 MEMOIR OF 
 
 but Templer didn't tell you all. On crossing 
 the Newton road I met an old woman, and toss- 
 ing her a shilling she handed me her blue flannel 
 apron, which I wrapped round my head, and 
 thus turbaned, rode like a grand Turk to the 
 end of the run." 
 
 Such was the man and such the horse of 
 whose deed Templer wrote in a strain of the 
 truest admiration : 
 
 " Fearless and first Ninth Harry urged his course, 
 Charging the fences with resistless force ; 
 Poor Nunky pays for all, a friend indeed 
 So good a Nunky proves in time of need." 
 
 That uncle was Mr. Edward Cooke, who, 
 sometime Under-Secretary of State for Ireland 
 during the administration of Lord Castlereagh, 
 gave him the horse. 
 
 But to return to the Teignbridge Cricket 
 Club : that Russell took no active interest in 
 the game may be inferred from the fact that, 
 notwithstanding the high popularity to which 
 the Club soon attained in the county, he ceased 
 to be a member of it early in the day. The 
 ground, it is true, was at a long distance from 
 his home at South Molton, some thirty-five or 
 forty miles away ; but had he really loved the 
 
THE RE V. JOHN R US SELL. 1 1 5 
 
 game, that distance would certainly not have 
 been an impediment to which he would have 
 given a moment's thought. 
 
 The] Club, ^however, 4iad already done him 
 good service ; it had] brought him into friendly 
 association not only with the Stover party, but 
 with many influential men connected with that 
 side of the county. At the death of one of its 
 best players, and certainly one of its most 
 valued members, the Rev. Henry Taylor, his 
 bat, carrying like Curius Dentatus the marks of 
 many a hard-fought tussle on its battered front, 
 was presented to the Club by his late widow, 
 and being elevated to a niche of honour in the 
 banqueting-room, received from the pen of a 
 loving friend the following inscription : 
 
 " Hail, honoured relic of the manly fame 
 By Taylor won at every noble game ! 
 Some gentle stream may haply mourn the tree* 
 That decked its -margin, ere it fell for thee ; 
 But deeper far Teignbridge laments the day, 
 When that stout arm was turned again to clay : 
 Relic, alas ! thy gladsome work is done, 
 Death is the bowler, and the game is won : 
 But rest thou here, still eloquent to tell 
 The grief of those who loved the man so well. 
 
 E. W. L. DAVIES." 
 
 * It may not be generally known that cricket-bats are made 
 from the willow tree. 
 
Ii6 MEMOIR OF 
 
 The hunting men, however, with whom 
 :Russell associated at Teignbridge, brilliant 
 riders and first-class sportsmen as a few of 
 .them were, constituted but a small portion of 
 the party who met at Stover to enjoy Mr. 
 Templer's hospitality, and hunt with his hounds. 
 The following gentlemen, fellow-sportsmen with 
 Russell, the remembrance of whom will long be 
 cherished in the county of Devon, are notably 
 mentioned in the spirited verses, to which allu- 
 sion has already been made. 
 
 First on the list comes Mr. John King, of 
 Fowelscombe, "John King of the West," an 
 able sportsman, who, according to Russell, knew 
 the habits of a fox better than most men of his 
 day. After hunting a portion of Mr. Pode's 
 country in Devon, Mr. King became Master of 
 the Hambledon Hounds, and subsequently, 
 while following Mr. Trelawny's pack, died in 
 the saddle on Dartmoor. 
 
 2. Mr. John Crocker Bulteel, of Flete, the 
 originator of the Lyneham Pack, afterwards so 
 famous under the mastership of Mr. Trelawny. 
 Besides being a keen sportsman, Mr. Bulteel's 
 genius was one of the highest order, and the 
 sallies of wit, which, like the sparkling brooks 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 117 
 
 of his native country, flowed so pleasantly from 
 his tongue, must have made the very rafters of 
 Stover ring with merriment. In such company, 
 whether in the field or at "table-board," 
 good-fellowship and sport must have reigned 
 supreme. 
 
 3. Mr. Thomas Bulteel, the " spruce little 
 cousin" of Mr. J. C. Bulteel, a light-weight and 
 a bold rider, whom, when hounds were running 
 hard, no timber could stop, no fence dismay. 
 
 4. Mr. Paul Ourry Treby, of Goodamoor, 
 the well-known " fox-hunter, rough and ready,'* 
 a classic scholar, and a rare specimen of a high- 
 minded English gentleman. 
 
 5. Mr. Salusbury Trelawny, afterwards Sir. 
 William S. Trelawny, a lineal descendant of 
 Jonathan Trelawny, Bishop of Bristol, who, 
 with six other prelates, was sent to the Tower 
 by King James the Second ; an act that gave- 
 rise to the patriotic song still sung by Cornish- 
 men with unabated enthusiasm, a verse of which 
 runs thus 
 
 " And have they fixed the where and when ? 
 
 And shall Trelawny die ? 
 Then twenty thousand Cornishmen 
 Shall know the reason why ! " 
 
 Of Sir William and a hound of his, called 
 
1 18 MEMOIR OF 
 
 Whirligig, Mr Arthur Harris, of Hayne, records 
 the following interesting anecdote : 
 
 " According to tradition Whirligig was an 
 extraordinary hound in everyway, and it is said 
 that he could kill a fox single-handed. Certain 
 it is that both the hound and his master per- 
 formed feats that old men still love to chronicle. 
 On one occasion, the story goes, Salusbury 
 Trelawny had brought his fox, late in the day 
 and nearly at nightfall, to a point on the Tamar 
 below Newbridge. The river was swollen and 
 rapid, and it was judged impossible for a fox to 
 have swum such a distance in so rapid a stream. 
 Salusbury Trelawny thought otherwise, so did 
 Whirligig, and neither were of a temper to be 
 diverted from their purpose. Getting into a 
 small boat, he rowed over to the other side, 
 sitting in the stern and holding the bridle of his 
 hunter, Cattern or Lufra, lightly in hand, while 
 the mare and the hound both animals attached 
 in a singular degree to their chivalrous master 
 crossed together, swimming side by side. 
 Not a hound followed. Whirligig recovered the 
 line on the other side, killed the half-drowned 
 fox, and master, hound, and horse, with the 
 head and brush, returned the way they came. 
 
THE RE V. JOHN R US SELL. 1 1 9 
 
 Brave ' Old Sarum ! ' he was indeed a glorious 
 fellow : he and Newton Fellowes were samples 
 of the ' gemis homo ' not easily to be found in a 
 modern day." 
 
 In addition to the names already mentioned, 
 nine other guests are severally described as 
 forming the 
 
 " . . . . party assembled at Stover 
 To hunt in the morning, and feast when 'twas over." 
 
 They were the Rev. Edward Clarke, of St. 
 Dominick, Mr. George Leach, the Rev. John 
 Templer, Mr. William and Erving Clark, of 
 Buckland Tout-Saints, Mr. Charles Gandy, Mr. 
 Henry Twysden, R.N., Mr. John Lyne Tem- 
 pler, of Highland House, and Captain J. Avern, 
 R.N. 
 
 Alas ! to Death's grim Ferryman all, in- 
 cluding the subject of this memoir, have been 
 summoned to pay their last copper ! 
 
120 MEMOIR OF 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 He Falls in Love Rides by Night to Bath His Grotesque 
 Mount in Milsom Street Is Married, and removes to Iddes- 
 leigh Keeps Foxhounds, and forms an Alliance with Mr. 
 C. A. Harris Difficulties with Fox -killers. 
 
 " Without the smile from partial beauty won, 
 Oh ! what were man ? a world without a sun ! " 
 
 CAMPBELL. 
 
 TOWARDS the end of 1825, or the beginning 
 of 1826, an event affecting the happiness of 
 Russell's life, at home and abroad, bid fair, 
 at least for a time, to imperil the devotion 
 which, up to this period, he had so exclusively 
 shown to the sylvan Queen, who beyond all 
 doubt hitherto had reigned in his heart with- 
 out a rival. 
 
 But strong and enduring as the bonds were 
 in which the goddess retained her willing cap- 
 tive, the time had now arrived when they were 
 destined to prove but as green withs com- 
 
THE RE V. JOHN RUSSELL. 1 2 1 
 
 pared with those of Venus, whose power both 
 the gods and men have alike shown to be 
 irresistible. 
 
 About this time he met with a lady whose 
 attractions at once arrested the current of his 
 thoughts, and brought him on bended knee to 
 sue for her hand. That lady was Miss Penelope 
 Incledon Bury, the daughter of Admiral and 
 Mrs. Bury, of Dennington House, near Barn- 
 staple. Both the father and mother being pure 
 North-Devoners, and claiming descent from 
 two good old county families, they were proud 
 of the " haveage " to which they belonged. 
 Nor could they have taken exception to 
 Russell's pedigree ; he himself being a des- 
 cendant of the Russells of Kingston-Russell ; 
 for, at the time of the Sampford Courtenay 
 riots in the West, Lord Russell, then at Exeter, 
 appointed one of his own relatives to preach 
 against "the old religion;" and from him came 
 the Russells who have remained in the county 
 ever since. 
 
 Mrs. Bury, the mother of Penelope, was of 
 the knightly family of Chichester, of Hall, whose 
 pedigree is chronicled by John Prince, the 
 worthy Vicar of Berry Pomeroy. 
 
122 MEMOIR OF 
 
 If Russell, then, had an eye to a 'Mass wi' a 
 lang pedigree " a point he would have con- 
 sidered of the first importance in selecting a 
 horse or a hound he could scarcely have made 
 a better choice. But it is obvious that other 
 and broader views must have influenced his 
 judgment in this matter ; for a more sensible, 
 warm-hearted, generous woman than Penelope 
 Bury proved herself to be, never breathed the 
 breath of life. Russell must have stood an inch 
 higher in stature when he found himself first 
 favourite for so fair a prize the only real prize 
 in life he may, with truth, be said to have ever 
 won. 
 
 But the event should not be anticipated. 
 When Mr. George Templer, of Stover, parted 
 with his big pack to the Rev. H. F. Yeatman, 
 in the early part of 1826, Russell and Templer 
 paid him a visit at Stock House, near Sher- 
 borne ; when, under his inauguration, the Black- 
 moor Vale country was first established. To 
 entertain his friends, whether indoors or out of 
 doors a felicitous gift he possessed beyond 
 ordinary mortals Mr. Yeatman ordered out his 
 own famous pack of harriers (which, by-the-by, 
 were dwarf fox-hounds, as perfect in shape as 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 123 
 
 they were in work), and showed them a capital 
 day's sport ; when the hare was sinking, Rus- 
 sell, to save her, put his horse at a chained 
 gate, rode over it, and picked up the hare in 
 front of the hounds. 
 
 Nearly fifty years after that event, Mr. 
 Digby, of Sherborne Castle, finding himself in 
 company with Russell at, I believe, Lord Polti- 
 more's house in Dorsetshire, asked him if he 
 remembered the first time they met in the 
 hunting-field ? 
 
 " Perfectly well," replied Russell; " it was 
 with dear old Yeatman's hounds in 1826 ; the 
 first time Templer and I stayed with him at 
 Stock House." 
 
 "Quite true," replied Mr. Digby; "you 
 rode over a chained gate, and took up the 
 hare before me. I could have shot you on the 
 spot." 
 
 " You'd have spoiled some sport if you 
 had," said Russell, not a little amused that the 
 incident, and youthful jealousy it had given rise 
 to, should be remembered after the lapse of so 
 many years. 
 
 That very night, after the dinner and day's 
 sport had been duly discussed, Russell mounted 
 
124 MEMOIR OF 
 
 a hack, one he had brought with him from 
 South Molton, and, starting from Stock, he 
 shaped his course, as he best could, directly for 
 Bath, hoping to reach that city, a distance of 
 some fifty odd miles, before the inns and stables 
 were all closed for the night. At Warminster, 
 however, he found it expedient to leave his 
 own horse behind him, and hire a fresh one, 
 the landlord of the principal inn being quite 
 ready to supply him with " a rare goer," which 
 he averred " would carry him like an infant in 
 a cradle, and cover the ground in less than two 
 hours." 
 
 " Bring him out, then," said Russell, 
 "as quickly as you can; that will suit me 
 exactly." 
 
 The night was now pitch dark ; not a moon 
 nor a star in the sky ; not a ray of light, except 
 that from a dim horn-lantern, enabling Russell 
 to distinguish the head from the tail of the 
 horse on which he was about to mount. How- 
 ever, he was soon in the saddle ; the beast, too, 
 was a willing one, being probably, like John 
 Gilpin's horse, 
 
 " . . . . right glad to miss 
 The lumb'ring of the wheels ;" 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 125 
 
 but never before nor since did Russell undergo 
 such a bumping as on the ribs of that War- 
 minster hack. 
 
 On his arrival at Bath, long after midnight, 
 happily for him one hostelry still remained 
 open, the White Lion Inn ; where, finding he 
 could obtain a bed for himself and a stall for 
 his horse, he rested for the night. But when 
 he quitted the animal and committed him to the 
 charge of the ostler, such was the darkness still 
 prevailing, that Russell knew no more about 
 the shape, appearance, and colour of the beast 
 than he did about the Greek horse that entered 
 Troy. He might have known, however, that 
 the heroes inside that wooden steed must 
 have had a rough time of it, if its movements 
 were not easier than those of his Warminster 
 hack. 
 
 " Feed him well," said Russell to the ostler, 
 as he groped his way out of the yard; "and 
 don't forget to bring him in the morning 
 to No. 9, Milsom Street, exactly at eleven 
 o'clock." 
 
 The Pump Room books of that day, if in 
 existence, would still show the names and num- 
 bers of the visitors who were then occupying 
 
126 MEMOIR OF 
 
 No. 9 in that fashionable locality ; they were 
 no other than Admiral, Mrs., and Miss 
 Penelope Bury, from Dennington House, North 
 Devon. 
 
 Here, then, was the guiding star which had 
 led Russell to abandon both friends and hounds 
 at Stock ; and in spite of the gloom, had lighted 
 his path with a hopeful ray to the city of waters, 
 at which we now find him safely arrived. He 
 had promised Miss Bury to ride with her in the 
 morning, and of course took care to be in 
 attendance at No. 9 in good time before the 
 horses were ordered and the lady prepared to 
 start. Other cavaliers, however, had been 
 invited to join the party ; notably, the Rev. 
 Alexander Baillie, a fine, handsome young 
 fellow, as agreeable as he was good-looking, 
 and a perfect beau ; also the long-lamented 
 John Bayly, a finished horseman, and one of 
 the best men across country in all England ; 
 besides one or two more, mounted on steeds 
 well-bred and with skins glossy as satin 
 itself. 
 
 Miss Bury, too, was now in the saddle ; and 
 but for a short delay, occasioned by the non- 
 arrival of Russell's horse, the whole cavalcade 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 127 
 
 were prepared to start at the appointed time. 
 At length the ostler made his appearance, 
 hurrying forward, as he best could, an animal 
 that seemed only fit for a dog-kennel ; he was 
 black as ink, had no hair on mane or tail, 
 and scarcely an ounce of flesh on his bones ; 
 for, literally, 
 
 '* His strutting ribs on both sides show'd 
 Like furrows he himself had plow'd ; 
 For underneath the skirt of pannel, 
 'Twixt every two there was a channel." 
 
 Above all, an old-fashioned post-boy's saddle, 
 brass-mounted and secured by a huge crupper 
 to his rat-tail, formed a conspicuous feature on 
 the garran's back ; and that, coupled with his 
 poster-like appearance, was quite enough to stir 
 up first a titter, then a roar of laughter, as it 
 quickly did, among the lookers-on. 
 
 Never, perhaps, was lover placed in a more 
 trying predicament ; the shafts of ridicule being 
 the most fatal of all weapons to a man bidding 
 for promotion, if he is made the unhappy butt 
 at which they are aimed. Many a hero, with 
 courage enough to head a Balaclava charge and 
 face the deadliest foe, would have shuddered to 
 mount that beast under existing circumstances, 
 
128 MEMOIR OF 
 
 and would certainly have darted off in search of 
 another charger less picturesque in his points, 
 and more befitting the light brigade assembled 
 in Milsom Street on that eventful morn. Com- 
 paring their steeds with his own, he might well 
 have thought that the companionship of such a 
 Rosinante would not only compromise his own 
 dignity, but outrage the feelings of his gay and 
 well-mounted comrades. 
 
 But Russell had no such apprehension ; he 
 stood his ground and joined heartily in the 
 laugh ; told them of the landlord's craft at War- 
 minster, and his own inability to detect it, owing 
 to the Stygian darkness that prevailed at the 
 time and throughout his journey. He then 
 sprang into the saddle ; and by him at least, if 
 not by one other of the party, the quaint figure 
 and accoutrements of his horse were speedily 
 forgotten ; nor for one moment did they appear 
 to trouble his thoughts during the rest of the 
 day a day he loved to record as one among 
 the happiest, if not the happiest, of his long life. 
 
 But if, on this memorable visit to Bath, 
 there were other gallants in the field better 
 mounted and better equipped "than the Devon- 
 shire parson, certain it is that he, like Ulysses 
 
THE RE V. JOHN R US SELL. \ 29 
 
 of old, held his own against all comers ; for, 
 on the 3Oth of May, 1826, the fair Penelope 
 honoured him with her hand, and converted him 
 thenceforth into a happy Benedict. Soon after 
 this auspicious event, he retired from the charge 
 of George Nympton and South Molton parishes .; 
 and, after devoting but a brief period to the 
 usual hymeneal holiday and its attendant mys- 
 teries, he removed with his handsome bride to 
 Iddesleigh, near Hatherleigh ; and, his father 
 being the rector, he accepted the curacy of that 
 parish under him. 
 
 There is a story current, however, that 
 before he finally quitted South Molton, he and 
 Mrs. Russell attended divine service at that 
 church, and occupied of course a pew together. 
 Now at that time there lived at Whitechapel 
 Farm, near South Molton, a celebrated charac- 
 ter called John Sanger, an eccentric, hard-riding 
 yeoman, who, although weighing eighteen stone 
 and mounted on a thirteen-hand Exmoor pony, 
 had more than once beaten over the moor Mr. 
 Newton Fellowes, the great Squire of Egges- 
 ford, whose hunters were notably well bred and 
 the talk of all the country. Sanger belonged to 
 Bishop's Nympton parish ; but, on that Sunday, 
 
 9 
 
130 MEMOIR OF 
 
 when Russell and his bride made their appear- 
 ance at South Molton Church, he occupied a 
 seat at a little distance off, but exactly fronting 
 their pew. 
 
 Immediately on coming out of church he 
 marched up to Mrs. Russell, and with hat in 
 hand, and a profound bow, he said 
 
 " Good morning to you, ma'am ; I have 
 never seen in all my life such a fine woman as 
 you are. But you have spoiled my devotions ; 
 for I couldn't take my eyes off you all church 
 time." 
 
 This, beyond all doubt, was no mere com- 
 pliment ; but the honest expression of a plain, 
 out-spoken man. 
 
 It was but a short time after his marriage 
 with Miss Bury that Russell continued to keep 
 otter-hounds, for on removing to Iddesleigh, 
 the proceeds of which living his father had 
 assigned to him, he found himself in the centre 
 of a country so gloriously wild, and so adapted 
 to fox-hunting, that he determined at once to 
 elevate his standard and follow that sport in 
 preference to the other. Accordingly, in the 
 autumn of 1826, when the woodlands were 
 changing colour and draft-hounds their kennels, 
 
THE RE V. JOHN R US SELL. 1 3 1 
 
 Russell, gathering together about ten or twelve 
 couple from various sources, but chiefly from the 
 relics of the famous Stover pack, entered on his 
 first campaign in the wilds of Hatherleigh, 
 " hunting," as he says, "anything he could find 
 around his own garden ; " for the bounds of his 
 maiden country, if such it could be called, were 
 at first woefully confined to a very limited 
 area. 
 
 The Rev. W. H. Karslake, of Dolton, 
 appears to have been the only gentleman who, 
 at that time, kept hounds within a short distance 
 of Iddesleigh ; but as they were harriers, it 
 occurred to Russell that the enjoyment of the 
 nobler sport might well be secured in so inviting 
 a field, not only without prejudice to that gentle- 
 man, but with the concurrence, and, as he hoped, 
 the good-will of the two neighbouring Masters 
 of Foxhounds, the Hon. Newton Fellowes and 
 the Rev. Peter Glubb. The latter had for many 
 years kept and hunted a very killing pack near 
 Little Torrington ; while the former, who lived 
 at Eggesford, occupied, with his grand pack of 
 foxhounds, a rough and extensive country, over 
 which, by virtue of his manorial possessions, he 
 claimed, if he did not exercise, the almost feudal 
 
132 MEMOIR OF 
 
 rights of a baron of the fifteenth century. For 
 
 though, 
 
 " Kind, like a man, was he ; like a man, too, would have his 
 
 way." 
 
 The kennels of both these packs were within 
 ten miles of Iddesleigh, and nearly equidistant 
 from that place ; consequently, in so circum- 
 scribed a country, over which he might almost 
 have flown a paper kite, the prospect of pursuing 
 the wild animal with success would indeed have 
 been a hopeless one. It would also have in- 
 volved him in endless strife, for he must inevit- 
 ably have encroached on the conventional rights 
 of those gentlemen, and aroused their jealousy 
 and ill-will at every turn. Iddesleigh, if he did 
 so, he was well aware would be looked upon 
 as the centre of a civil war, and he as a kind of 
 Rob Roy a marauder and freebooter, who, by 
 violating a law strict as that of the Medes and 
 Persians, would be entitled to no quarter under 
 such outrageous circumstances. 
 
 To obtain, then, an enlargement of his too 
 narrow bounds just a few outlying covers get- 
 at-able by him, but rarely drawn by them 
 Russell, rather than incur such odium, appealed 
 point blank to Mr. Newton Fellowes and Mr, 
 
THE RE V. JOHN RUSSELL. 133 
 
 Glubb, both of whom readily and kindly con- 
 curred in granting him the favour he asked ; 
 namely, a slice of their respected countries on 
 either side of Iddesleigh. By that cession, 
 which, with his little pack, proved to be a suffi- 
 ciently ample one, he found, as he described it, 
 " flinging room both for himself and hounds." 
 
 But notwithstanding the unexampled sport 
 he was able to show with his first scratch lot, 
 some of which were mute and some too free of 
 tongue, many given to riot, to skirting and other 
 hereditary faults, he was not long in discovering 
 that he had still an uphill game to play in at- 
 tempting to establish an independent dynasty in 
 that country. 
 
 The sport of legitimate fox-hunting being 
 utterly ignored by a majority of the natives, it 
 had long been, and still was, their practice to 
 kill a fox whenever and however they could 
 catch him, fulfilling to the letter the sentiments 
 of the Highland chieftain 
 
 " Who ever reck'd, where, how, or when, 
 The prowling fox was trapp'd or slain ? " 
 
 In fact, to such an extent did this practice pre- 
 vail, that for the first season or two, owing to 
 the scarcity of foxes, Russell was compelled to 
 
134 MEMOIR OF 
 
 adopt the primitive plan of hunting both fox and 
 hare with the same hounds ; so that when the 
 real wild article was not to be found, the other 
 was always at hand to give his hounds a spin 
 and keep his field in good-humour. 
 
 He had not been long at Iddesleigh when, 
 one day as he was drawing for a fox, at some 
 distance from home, his ear caught the sound of 
 a church bell, rung in a jingling fashion, and 
 with more than usual clamour. A stranger 
 might well have supposed it to be a signal of 
 alarm intended to warn the country-side that a 
 fire had broken out on some neighbour's pre- 
 mises, and that the need of help was urgent 
 and pressing. But no such thing ; as Russell's 
 prophetic spirit too well divined, it was the 
 signal that a fox had been tracked to ground, 
 or balled into a brake ; and the bell sum- 
 moned every man who possessed a pickaxe, 
 a gun, or a terrier, to hasten to the spot 
 and lend a hand in destroying the noxious 
 animal. 
 
 Russell's letter is now before me, describing 
 his first adventure with a party bent on murder- 
 ing a fox in his new country : 
 
 " During the winter of the first year I was 
 
THE RE V. JOHN R US SELL. 135 
 
 at Iddesleigh, the snow at the time lying deep 
 on the ground, a native Bartholomew alias Bat 
 Anstey came to me and said, ' Hatherley bell 
 is a-ringing, sir.' 
 
 " * Ringing for what ? ' I inquired, with a 
 strong misgiving as to the cause of it. 
 
 " ' Well, sir, they've a-traced a fox in some- 
 where ; and they've a-sot the bell a-going to 
 collect the people to shoot un.' 
 
 "'Come, Bat, speak out like a man,' I replied, 
 ' and tell me where 'tis.' 
 
 " ' In Middlecot earths, sir ; just over the 
 Okement.' 
 
 " I was soon on the spot with about ten couple 
 of my little hounds, and found, standing around 
 the earths, about a hundred fellows the scum 
 of the country headed, I am almost ashamed 
 to say, by two gentlemen, Mr. Veale, of Passa- 
 ford, and his brother-in-law, Mr. Morris, of 
 Fishley, the father of Colonel W. Morris, of the 
 ' Light Brigade ' that brilliant swordsman to 
 whose memory a monument is erected on 
 Hatherleigh Moor. 
 
 " I remonstrated with these gentlemen, and 
 told them plainly that if they would leave the 
 earths, and preserve foxes for me, I would show 
 
136 MEMOIR OF 
 
 them more sport with my little pack in one day 
 than they would see in a whole year by des- 
 troying the gallant animal in so un-English a 
 way. 
 
 " Impressed, apparently, by what I had said, 
 both gentlemen instantly bade me a ' good morn- 
 ing,' turned on their heels and left the place ; 
 while a few shillings, distributed among the 
 crowd by way of compensation for the dis- 
 appointment I had caused them, induced them 
 to disperse and leave me almost sole occupant 
 of the ' situation.' 
 
 " Then, after waiting half an hour or so 
 near the spot, I turned my head towards home ; 
 but, before I arrived there, I met a man open- 
 mouthed, bawling out, * They've a-traced a fox 
 into Brimblecombe ; for I hear Dowland bell 
 a-going.' 
 
 " So off I went to Dowland in post haste ; 
 found out where the fox was lying, turned him 
 out of a furze bush, ran him one hour and forty 
 minutes a blaze of scent all the way and took 
 him up alive before the hounds on the very 
 earths I had so lately quitted ; where, unfor- 
 tunately for him, a couple of scoundrels 
 had remained on the watch, and had conse- 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 137 
 
 quently headed him short back from that 
 stronghold." 
 
 But Russell had not yet finished with the 
 fox-killers ; for, as he says, " The very next day 
 after the run from Brimblecombe, a man came 
 to Iddesleigh on purpose to inform me that 
 the bell was going at Beaford, and that a fox 
 had been traced into a brake near that hamlet. 
 The brake, in reality, though not far from 
 Iddesleigh, was in Mr. Glubb's country ; but, 
 feeling sure that the necessity of the case 
 would justify the encroachment, I let out the 
 hounds at once, and hurried to the spot with all 
 speed. 
 
 " On arriving at the brake I found only one 
 man near it ; and he, placed there as sentinel, 
 was guarding it from disturbance with a watchful 
 eye. I asked him to tell me where the fox was; 
 but he gave me a very impertinent answer, say- 
 ing ' he knawed better than that ; and wasn't 
 a-going to do no such thing.' 
 
 " I kept my temper, however, as well as I 
 could ; and pulling out half-a-crown, I said, 
 ' There, my man, I'd have given you that if you 
 had told me where he was.' 
 
 " The fellow's eye positively sparkled at sight 
 
1 38 MEMOIR OF 
 
 of the silver. ' Let me have it, then,' he replied, 
 1 and I will show you where he is to a yard.' 
 
 " On giving him the money, he pointed 
 to a tree on the opposite side of the valley, 
 and said, ' There, do you see that tree t'other 
 side ? Take the hounds to it, and they'll soon 
 find him.' 
 
 " ' I've drawn the brake inside that hedge 
 already,' I said, 'and he isn't there.' 
 
 " ' No,' he replied ; * but he's on the comb of 
 the hedge, close to that tree.' 
 
 " And so he was. I ran him an hour, and 
 lost him near where he was found. Then, just 
 as I was calling the hounds away to go home, 
 down came a crowd of men, women, and child- 
 ren, the first chiefly from the village inn, to see 
 this fox murdered. Many of them had brought 
 their loaded guns, were full of beer, and ' eager 
 for the fray.' And when they discovered that I 
 had disturbed their fox, as they were pleased 
 to designate him, their language was anything 
 but choice. 
 
 " A strapping young fellow, one of the prin- 
 cipal farmers in the parish, came up to me and 
 said, ' Who are you, sir, to come here and spoil 
 our sport ? ' 
 
THE RE V. JOHN R US SELL. 1 39 
 
 " 'You would have spoiled mine,' I replied, 
 'if you could.' 
 
 " ' You have no business here,' he said 
 defiantly. 
 
 " ' As much as you have,' I replied ; i for the 
 owner has given me leave to hunt over this 
 estate, and I mean doing so, too, whenever I 
 please. So get a horse, come out with me, and 
 I'll show you some fine sport, if you'll only give 
 up shooting foxes.' 
 
 " ' We'll shoot them whenever we can ; that 
 I'll promise you,' he said, in an angry tone. 
 
 " At that moment one of the hounds began 
 to howl. I looked round, saw she was in pain, 
 and asked, in a threatening manner, 'Who 
 kicked that hound ? ' 
 
 "No one spoke for half a minute, when a 
 little boy said, pointing to another, ' That boy 
 kicked her.' 
 
 " ' Did he ? ' I exclaimed ; ' then 'tis lucky 
 for him that he is a little boy' 
 
 " ' Why ? ' said the farmer with whom I had 
 previously been talking. 
 
 " ' Because,' I replied, ' if a man had kicked 
 her I would have horsewhipped him on the 
 spot.' 
 
140 MEMOIR OF 
 
 " ' You would find that a difficult job, if you 
 tried it,' was his curt answer. 
 
 " I jumped off my horse, threw down my 
 whip, and said, * Who's the man to prevent me ?' 
 
 " Not a word was spoken. ' I stood my 
 ground, and one by one the crowd retired, the 
 young farmer amongst the number ; and from 
 that day forward I secured for myself and suc- 
 cessors not only the good-will and , co-operation, 
 but the friendship, of some of the best fox- 
 preservers that the county of Devon, or any 
 other county, has ever seen." 
 
 The names of a few are still to be found 
 in the parish of Beaford : viz., Hearn, Snell, 
 Arnold, Leverton ; and especially a well-to-do 
 farmer at Dolton, named Wadland, who, though 
 harriers were kept in his parish, preferred 
 hunting with fox-hounds ; and many a time, 
 as Russell relates, has he seen him and a white- 
 smith, called Heard, of Beaford, crossing and 
 recrossing the Torri'dge on foot and in the 
 depth of winter, following his hounds. Fox- 
 hunters both were to the backbone. 
 
 After that event there can be little doubt 
 that the farmers, to their great credit, from one 
 end of the country to the other, finding the 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 141 
 
 kind of man they had to deal with, and the rare 
 sport he was able to show, by degrees gave up 
 the malpractice to which they had been so long 
 addicted ; and before two years were over, so 
 far from persecuting the fox, many a moor 
 farmer would rather have lost the best sheep in 
 his flock than seen the gallant animal killed in 
 any fashion except by hounds. 
 
 The influence, indeed, that Russell very 
 soon acquired, not only among the farmers, but 
 the great cover-owners of that country, was 
 quite marvellous ; it was not attributable to 
 territorial or monetary qualifications ; for, as all 
 the world knew, he certainly was no Carabbas, 
 nor did the tide of his exchequer ever rise 
 above low-water mark ; but it was entirely due 
 to his manly power as a sportsman, to his acute 
 knowledge of the fox's habits, his mode of 
 getting at him and driving him through the 
 strongest covers, to the fascination of his thrilling 
 cheer, and, above all, to the charm and hearti- 
 ness -of his manners. In truth, the feeling of 
 the farmers towards him amounted almost to a 
 devotion, and he was treated with a kind of 
 hero-worship, as if he were a man formed in a 
 different mould from other men. 
 
142 MEMOIR OF 
 
 The following anecdote, kindly contributed 
 by the Rev. H. Bourchier Wrey, who vouches 
 for its authenticity, affords a strong illustration 
 how a word from a man of Russell's influence 
 might have had such effect on a common-sense 
 juryman as to enable mercy to triumph over the 
 strict letter of a law which, from its undue 
 severity, became abrogated not long after the 
 event here recorded. 
 
 Tom Square was a man of peculiar habits 
 off by night and abed by day ; earth-stopping 
 in the season, and, when that business was 
 over, discovering the whereabouts of Jitters, 
 and whether the young vagabonds had after- 
 wards strayed : these were the exploits for which 
 Tom was renowned. His nocturnal habits, how- 
 ever, led eventually to serious results : the 
 sharp moor air, acting keenly on a probably 
 empty stomach, tempted him to look with 
 hungry eyes on some well-to-do Exmoor hog- 
 getts, which, from time to time, the owners 
 found to be absent without leave. 
 
 In a word, he took to sheep-stealing ; and 
 as that crime was known to be increasing in the 
 neighbourhood, the farmers combined to set a 
 watch and, if possible, detect the culprits. So 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 143 
 
 our poor friend Tom, with others, " got into 
 trouble." He was suspected, watched, caught 
 red-handed, and, although many believed his 
 assertion that " 'Twas the very fust time he had 
 ever doo'd zich a thing," yet was he proceeded 
 against according to law ; he was arraigned, 
 tried, found guilty, sentenced, and the extreme 
 penalty carried out in fact, poor Tom Square 
 was hanged. 
 
 Shortly after this sad event, Russell hap- 
 pened to fall in with James R., a neighbouring 
 farmer, who, as the former had been told, had 
 served on the jury in the above case. "Why, 
 Jem," said Russell, accosting him in a tone of 
 strong remonstrance, " how came this about ? 
 You were on the jury which tried Tom Square ! 
 there surely was something to be said for the 
 poor fellow. I've been told it was the first time 
 he had ever done so. You know what a quiet 
 man he was, always ready to do a good turn 
 for a neighbour. 'Twas a pity, Jem, that you 
 should have given your voice against him." 
 
 " Bless us, Mistre Rissell, yeu doan't zay zo. 
 My senses ! If us had on'y but knaw'd they 
 was yeur honour's thoughts, us wid ha* put it 
 right, fai'. But there, my Lord Jidge said he 
 
144 MEMOIR OF 
 
 did ouft to be hanged and zo us hanged un. 
 But, bless 'ee, if us had on'y knaw'd yeur 
 honour cared about un, us wid ha' put it right 
 in quick time." 
 
 Again, a case of libel was about to be tried 
 at Exeter between Russell and a gentleman 
 called Nott. A special jury being sworn, one 
 of them, Captain Adney, thus addressed his 
 brother jurymen : " Now, gentlemen, pray 
 understand me! I've a pair of new buckskin 
 breeches on " (he always wore them and top- 
 boots), "and I've made up my mind to sit here, 
 till my skin comes through them to the bare 
 boards, before I give a verdict against Jack 
 Russell." In five minutes afterwards the case 
 was compromised, to the relief and entire satis- 
 faction of Captain Adney. 
 
 Some years afterwards I was present myself 
 when Russell received the following letter from 
 a farmer on the North Molton side of his 
 country ; it ran thus :- 
 
 " SIR JOHN RISSELL, 
 
 " Yeur honour will plaize to cum up 
 to Ben Twitching wi' th' dogs : us be ate out o' 
 they voxes. Mistiss kipth on a-telling up and 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 145 
 
 zeth, us shan't ha' a Geuse to kill, cum Chris- 
 mus. But I've a zaid, I'd gi' her a new gown 
 to mak' up for't ; zo, her han't a vexed zo mich 
 zince. But do ee cum & gi' us a bit o' sport, 
 Sir. 
 
 " Yeur honour's humbl Sarvent, 
 
 " T T " 
 
 To give a catalogue of all the farmers' 
 names who hunted with Russell and became 
 eventually the staunchest fox -preservers, would 
 now be a long and difficult task ; for so many 
 were they that the list would at least fill a 
 column or two of the Times. A few, however, 
 must not be omitted ; such good men and true, 
 for instance, as Mr. Peter Tanton, of Wrays 
 Farm, whose brake at Wrays never lacked a 
 litter of foxes. He was the owner of a cele- 
 brated grey mare by " Crickneck," her dam 
 being a grey Exmoor by " Katerfelto " this 
 last horse, the sire of such wondrous stock, and 
 the hero of that attractive story written by Mr. 
 Whyte-Melville, is said to have been captured 
 after his long run on Exmoor ; and then bought, 
 according to a tradition still prevalent in the 
 region of Hatherleigh, by the Rev. John Rus- 
 
 10 
 
146 MEMOIR OF 
 
 sell, sen., the rector of Iddesleigh, and Russell's 
 father, in whose possession the horse died. 
 Then there was Mr. John Brendon, of Red 
 Windows, near Chillaton, a fine rider, with con- 
 summate nerve and good hands. The East- 
 cotts of Broad wood widger and Norton ; Brown 
 of Hollacombe, Parson of Panson, Seccombe of 
 Seccombe, a family that have held their own at 
 Seccombe from a period antecedent to the 
 Norman Conquest ; Cory of Staddon, Oliver 
 Palmer of Tinhay, Tickel of Bratton-Clovelly, 
 and that rare specimen of a yeoman, Smale of 
 Thorn. 
 
 But the encouragement Russell met with 
 from the cover-ow T ners around him was, in some 
 respects, equally warm and gratifying ; for, be- 
 sides the cession of the country made to him 
 by Mr. Newton Fellowes and Mr. Glubb, an- 
 other large landed proprietor, Mr. John Morth 
 Woolcombe, of Ashbury, undertook to preserve 
 the wild districts of Broadbury for him ; while 
 he himself, although hunting three days a week 
 with his own hounds, rarely failed to join Rus- 
 sell's little pack, whenever they met within 
 reach of Ashbury. Many others, too, supported 
 him in like manner, promising to preserve 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 147 
 
 foxes, and inviting him with much heartiness to 
 draw their covers whenever it suited his pur- 
 pose to do so. 
 
 But, as a general rule, the support they gave 
 him was limited chiefly to such concessions ; 
 material aid, in the form of a subscription, was 
 neither asked for nor given ; and, although 
 large fields attended his meets, the sinews of 
 war for hounds, horses, and keepers were at first, 
 with one exception, provided by himself alone. 
 That exception was Mr. C. Arthur Harris, of 
 Hayne, a young enthusiastic squire, devoted 
 to hunting, and himself a Master of Hounds. 
 He had made Russell's acquaintance in 1826, 
 at the Chumleigh Club, which flourished for so 
 many years under the able auspices of Mr. 
 Newton Fellowes, Mr. J. M. Woolcombe, " the 
 Lord of Ashbury," Mr. L. Buck, Mr. J. Dicker 
 Fortescue, and other Devonshire Worthies, 
 both of the Northern and Southern divisions of 
 the county ; but of that club more anon. 
 
 One day's hunting together was alone suf- 
 ficient to convince Harris that Russell's know- 
 ledge of the craft and management of hounds 
 was of no ordinary stamp or quality ; and 
 shortly afterwards, out of sheer admiration for 
 
148 MEMOIR OF 
 
 his " talents," which a few more days had con- 
 firmed, he proposed throwing in his lot with 
 him and bearing a liberal share, but not an 
 equal one, in the maintenance of the united 
 packs. 
 
 They struck hands at once ; the offer being 
 accepted by Russell subject to the following 
 reservation, namely, that the hounds should be- 
 long to him, and that he alone should hunt and 
 control them, terms to which the younger and 
 less experienced sportsman very sensibly agreed. 
 Accordingly, on a given day in 1827, the two 
 packs met at Five Oaks, near Okehampton, in 
 all about seventy couple, which Russell, know- 
 ing to a handful of meal the value of every 
 hound, quickly drafted down to thirty-five 
 couple. With this lot he proposed hunting fox 
 alone, giving the country two days a week, 
 with an occasional bye-day according to circum- 
 stances. 
 
 It should be mentioned, however, that, pre- 
 vious to this arrangement, sundry interchanges 
 of hounds, and especially of puppies, had taken 
 place between him and Mr. Harris ; all above 
 twenty inches going to Russell, and those under 
 that standard to the Hayne kennels. It was at 
 
THE RE V. JOHN RUSSELL. 1 49 
 
 this period that a hound in Russell's pack, called 
 " Daphne," by Meynell's " Dreadnought," from 
 Meynell's " Princess," attracted the special 
 admiration of all who witnessed her marvellous 
 sagacity and power of nose. She was perfect 
 in every way : in drawing, in driving, and in 
 line-hunting. With a wave of the hand from 
 Russell she would draw a linhay, a pig-sty, or 
 any conceivable place in which a beaten fox 
 would try to conceal itself. 
 
 It is related of her that, after a hard chase 
 in the Hatherleigh country, the hounds had 
 brought their fox into a farmyard, where they 
 threw up, and failed to carry it a yard farther. 
 " Daphne," however, flinging to the front, held 
 the line into a vacant cow-house ; then on to 
 the manger, half filled with hay, where she just 
 whimpered, then clambering over the rack into 
 the loft, or "tallet," forced, as it were, the run- 
 ning, and out bolted the fox, ran the ridge of a 
 thatched outhouse, jumped down into a pig-sty, 
 and there the hounds had him in a moment. 
 "Mr. Woolcombe, of Ashbury, nearly rubbed 
 his nose off with delight." 
 
 The combination of the two packs had taken 
 place but a short time, when, towards the end 
 
150 MEMOIR OF 
 
 of the season of 1827, an episode occurred 
 which, but for an immediate explanation on the 
 part of Russell, might have caused a rupture of 
 the newly-formed alliance, and brought it there 
 and then to an untimely end. A bye-day had 
 been arranged, near Five Oaks, in the Bratton- 
 Clovelly country, for the purpose not only of 
 enjoying a day's sport, but of closely testing the 
 merits of the united pack. True to his time, 
 Mr. Harris, accompanied by two friends who 
 were staying with him, namely, Mr. John Glan- 
 ville and Mr. William Coryton, of Pentillie, 
 made his appearance at the appointed rendez- 
 vous ; but there they found no hounds, no 
 Russell, nor a human being to greet their 
 arrival. 
 
 After waiting for some time, not without 
 sundry growls and misgivings, Harris, unwilling 
 to lose the chance of sport and disappoint his 
 friends who had been invited purposely to 
 witness the work of the combined forces and 
 Russell's skill in handling them pulled out his 
 watch and proposed allowing another half-hour 
 before they gave him up and returned whence 
 they came. In the midst of this quandary the 
 music of a pack of hounds in full cry suddenly 
 
THE RE V. JOHN RUSSELL. 1 5 1 
 
 burst on their ears ; and at the same time, a 
 countryman coming up, Harris inquired if he 
 had seen the hounds, and whose they were then 
 running so merrily. 
 
 " Passon Rissell's, sir, in coose," responded 
 the man ; " they'm a driving hard, sure enow ; 
 and he home to the tails o' mun." 
 
 Utterly unable to account for such an extra- 
 ordinary proceeding on the part of Russell, the 
 three gentlemen determined to go in pursuit 
 and ask him to explain his apparent want of 
 courtesy in throwing off so " wide of the meet," 
 and disappointing them of their day's sport. 
 On coming to a turn of the road near Inward- 
 leigh Moor, there they spied Russell, cool as a 
 cucumber, sitting at his ease on the back of 
 Billy, his ' famous pony-hunter, and quietly 
 watching the hounds. 
 
 " What on earth are you about ? " inquired 
 Harris, in a somewhat hasty and impatient 
 tone. 
 
 " Very sorry to have kept you waiting, 
 Arthur," responded Russell, good-humouredly, 
 " but the truth is, I fed rather late last night, and 
 the hounds being scarcely fit to trim a good fox 
 at once, I thought I'd find a hare first, and let 
 
152 MEMOIR OF 
 
 them clear their pipes a bit before they tackled 
 the stouter animal. They'll come to the road in 
 a minute, and I'll stop them then." 
 
 So he did. The hounds were then trotted 
 off to a small spinney at the back of Five Oaks, 
 where they found at once ; and away they went, 
 straight as a bee-line, over the Inwardleigh 
 Moor, carrying a fine head over Bowerland 
 Moor towards Bridestow, and on to Sourton 
 and Prewley Moor ; killing him between that 
 and Lidford, on Dartmoor. Time, one hour 
 and forty-five minutes. 
 
 It is superfluous to add that, under the 
 influence of that glorious run, the cloud of the 
 morning vanished like a summer mist, and 
 never more darkened a day of that brief but 
 happy alliance. 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 153 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 The Artificial Fox-EarthAccession of Country The Bodmin 
 Meetings Long Distances to Cover Sir Tatton Sykes The 
 Ivy Bridge Hunt Week Rides Home. 
 
 " O, said he, you will never live to my age, without you 
 keep yourself in breath with exercise, and in heart with 
 joyfulness ; too much thinking doth consume the spirits ; 
 and oft it falls out, that, while one thinks too much of his 
 doing, he leaves to do the effect of his thinking." 
 
 SIR PHILIP SIDNEY. 
 
 RUSSELL had been married one year, within a 
 day, when, on the 2Qth of May, 1827, his wife 
 presented him with his first-born son, whom 
 they named John Bury a precious though a 
 short-lived offering, for the child died, and was 
 buried in Iddesleigh Churchyard on the follow- 
 ing 3ist of May. On the 23rd of August, 
 however, in that year, 1828, just three months 
 afterwards, a second son was born to them at 
 Dennington House, and received the names of 
 Richard Bury Russell a gentleman who for 
 some time was Colonel of the North Devon 
 
154 MEMOIR OF 
 
 Militia Artillery, a J.P. for that county, and 
 died in 1883. 
 
 On turning over some manuscripts relating 
 to those early days and the versatile power of 
 his little pack, I find, in Russell's handwriting, 
 the following letter, which, for the uncommon 
 day's sport it records, is entitled to a prominent 
 place in this memoir : 
 
 " One evening, soon after the hounds had 
 been fed, who should ride to our door at Iddes- 
 leigh but Billy Morris, a great chum of mine, 
 then a small boy living with his father and 
 mother at Fishley, but afterwards a distinguished 
 swordsman, and one of the glorious Six Hun- 
 dred in the Balaclava Charge. 
 
 " ' I've a holiday to-morrow, Mr. Russell,' 
 he said, 'and I've come to ask if you will 
 kindly bring out your hounds, and show me a 
 day's sport.' 
 
 " ' With all my heart,' I replied ; ' but I have 
 promised your father's tenant at Norleigh to kill 
 a hare for him ; so come and meet me there at 
 ten o'clock.' 
 
 " ' I'll be there to a minute,' he said, thank- 
 ing me warmly, and then galloping off on his 
 pony, ' big with hope/ 
 
THE RE V. JOHN R US SELL. 1 5 5 
 
 "It was a wretched morning a regular 
 downpour of rain and no one came to the 
 meet but dear little Billy and Lord Clinton's 
 steward from Heanton. Well, the hounds 
 found a hare, and killed her ; found another, 
 and she went as straight as a line to Gribble- 
 ford Bridge, on which we also killed her. 
 
 " ' Now,' said Billy, 'just throw them into 
 uncle's covers ; there's a fox there, I know.' 
 
 " ' Not on any account,' I replied, 'till I have 
 his permission to do so.' 
 
 " ' But I'm sure you may,' he continued ; 
 1 for he told me so last night.' 
 
 " I begged him, however, to ride up to 
 Passaford, half a mile off, and bring me word 
 ( yea or nay,' from his uncle, and promised that 
 I would wait an hour for his return. I did wait 
 a full hour, when suddenly the hounds dashed 
 in over the road-fence, and in an instant a fox 
 was on his legs. Ran him up close to the 
 house, but I saw nothing of Billy ; then break- 
 ing away, he put his head straight for Dart- 
 moor ; but the hounds raced up to him before 
 he reached Sourton. I viewed him ahead, and 
 saw him crawl into a large furze-bush on the 
 open moor ; rode up to it, and, before the 
 
156 MEMOIR OF 
 
 hounds arrived, had him in my arms. But 
 there was no house, and therefore no bag, 
 within a couple of miles ; so I threw him down, 
 and they ate him no one up but myself. I 
 then went back to Norleigh ; but, before I 
 arrived there, a farmer came up and asked me 
 to kill a hare for him, which I did ; the hounds, 
 however, tore her so much that he begged me 
 to try again. I did so, and found a tough old 
 lady, that gave me as good a run as the dog- 
 fox had done, though not so straight ; and I 
 killed her also two brace of hares and a fox 
 a very satisfactory day's work, which was talked 
 about at every farmer's ordinary, far and near, 
 and established my little pack on a firm footing 
 from that day forth." 
 
 But to return to his coadjutor, Mr. Harris, 
 of Hayne. Owing to the hitherto malpractice 
 of the natives for so long a time, and the con- 
 sequent scarcity of foxes throughout the land, 
 he quickly saw that unless some plan were 
 adopted by which he could at once protect the 
 stock and secure a find, even two days a week 
 would be too much for the country ; especially 
 as Russell, unlike the man whom one jack-snipe 
 supplied with sport for a whole season, almost 
 
THE RE V. JOHN RUSSELL. 1 57 
 
 invariably killed his fox whenever he found him. 
 In the year 1828, for instance, Russell found 
 thirty-two foxes killed twenty - eight, and 
 earthed a brace ; besides killing seventy-three 
 brace of hares with the same scratch pack, of 
 which hares the hounds certainly ate their 
 share, namely, thirty-six brace. 
 
 Foxes, however, and foxes only, were the 
 sole object of the new alliance ; and with a view 
 to cultivate and increase their number, besides 
 feeing keepers and propitiating the farmers' 
 wives with attractive and useful presents a 
 handsome red shawl to one and a family Bible 
 to another Mr. Harris set to work to construct 
 artificial earths in three of the chief covers on 
 the Hayne Estate ; the plan for which had been 
 given him by Mr. Paul Ourry Treby, of Good- 
 amoor, one of the best friends to fox-hunting 
 the Dartmoor country ever knew. 
 
 The following rough sketch will probably 
 enable the reader to understand the plan on 
 which the earth was formed. It consisted 
 simply of a narrow walled drain ; which, being 
 just large enough to admit a small terrier, was 
 constructed on the slope of a hill in the shape of 
 the letter Y. 
 
158 MEMOIR OF 
 
 In the lower or main entrance was an iron 
 plate worked by a spring, but fixed by a pad- 
 lock, and covered with earth, over which plate 
 the foxes travelled habitually. 
 
 In the centre was a wide circular chamber, 
 from which the upper passages branched off; 
 and the top of that chamber being covered with 
 a close-fitting lid, the food for the cubs was 
 popped in through it. These were fed twice in 
 the week until full-grown, and afterwards every 
 Saturday. 
 
 When a fox was wanted, the spring plate 
 was unpadlocked ; and the upper entrances 
 being stopped, each with a strong gorse faggot, 
 the moment he entered, the plate tripped up 
 behind him, and there he was safe and ready 
 for the coming event. 
 
 It was usually a two o'clock affair ; and 
 when a glass or two of old sherry that spur in 
 the head which is said to be worth two on the 
 heel had been handed about in front of the 
 mansion, Blatchford, the keeper, at a given sig- 
 nal, ungorsed the upper entrances just before 
 the hounds came up ; then put in a terrier at the 
 lower end, and away. 
 
 It never failed; but it was a curious fact that 
 
THE RE V. JOHN RUSSELL. 1 59 
 
 foxes bolted from the Newton Wood earth, at 
 one end of the park, almost invariably made for 
 the wilds of Dartmoor, while those found in the 
 Townleigh earth, on the other side of the park, 
 broke away in quite a different direction. It 
 puzzled even Russell to account for the why and 
 the wherefore of this understanding between 
 the fox families, but so it was. 
 
 The secret was well kept for years ; but the 
 certainty of having a fox on foot, directly after 
 the sherry had been imbibed, gave rise to many 
 strange reports on the subject : some said it was 
 a bagman from Leadenhall Market : others 
 fancied the natives notably that there was 
 some " whistness," or witchcraft, in the busi- 
 ness ; it might be, as they thought, the work of 
 Dick Down, the old huntsman who was eaten 
 by the Hayne hounds, and whose ghost was 
 known to haunt the covers round the park. But 
 Mr. John Crocker Bulteel, in his humorous 
 mood, gave another version of the matter, and 
 amused the county with a story which Blatch- 
 ford, he said, had told him, when he brought 
 down a hound to Flete from the Hayne kennels. 
 On asking Blatchford how the world went with 
 him, he replied : " Well enough, sir, thank 'ee, 
 
160 MEMOIR OF 
 
 on the whole ; but, Lor, my stummick be almost 
 a wored out by lying so long, wi' the fox in a 
 bag, on that cold ground up to Newton Wood, 
 a-waiting for the squire's holley, and for Passon 
 Rissell to bring up they hounds, and then to let 
 un goo. I've scarce no stummick left, yeur 
 honour ; 'tis fairly stived up wi' th' cold." 
 
 The foxes, however, were no bagmen, but 
 the real old Hectors of the moor, as they so 
 often proved themselves to be by going straight 
 away for their native and far-distant homes. 
 Vixens and game were scarce in those days, 
 and, to satisfy the cravings of nature, it was 
 marvellous how far a fox would travel in search 
 of the one and the other. The cubs fostered 
 in the artificial earth on arriving at maturity 
 soon brought immigrants to the colony from a 
 distant land, and with one of these before him, 
 whether found in the drain or a neighbouring 
 cover, it was no child's-play for Russell and his 
 hounds to pull him down ere he reached his own 
 diggings in some inaccessible tor on the rugged 
 Dartmoor. 
 
 Oh! it would stir a man's heart to the core 
 to hear Russell describe some of those Broad- 
 bury runs, which the brush of a Carter, or the 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 161 
 
 pen even of a Whyte-Melville would have been 
 powerless to paint with a like effect. But to have 
 seen and enjoyed them, as he and his friends 
 did, must have been a foretaste to them of the 
 Elysian fields. 
 
 "It was said by Voltaire, that Marlborough 
 had never besieged a fortress which he had not 
 taken, never fought a battle which he had not 
 won, never conducted a negotiation which he 
 had not brought to a prosperous close." So 
 wrote Lord Stanhope ; and every one who has 
 read his charming history of Queen Anne's 
 reign will remember that the Duke of Marl- 
 borough's achievements himself, beyond all 
 doubt, one of the first military chiefs of that or 
 any age could never have been so brilliant and 
 so uniformly successful but for the support he 
 obtained from "the Grand Alliance." 
 
 In like manner, if it be permitted to compare 
 great things with small the war of powerful 
 nations with the sylvan campaign which Russell 
 was waging among the remote and peaceful 
 Britons of the far West it is equally certain 
 that he too proved himself a great general in his 
 way ; killing or accounting for his fox almost 
 every time he found him ; and conquering all 
 
 ii 
 
i62 MEMOIR OF 
 
 classes, not less by the sport he showed than by 
 his genial fellowship, manly bearing, and con- 
 summate tact. Nor should the support he met 
 with from his alliance with Mr. Arthur Harris, 
 of Hayne, remain unacknowledged ; for, beyond 
 all question, the active and liberal co-operation 
 of that gentleman did him invaluable service in 
 his first start as a Master of Hounds. 
 
 Although not yet in possession of that pro- 
 perty, his father and mother being still alive, the 
 young squire brought- all the influence of his 
 paternal acres to bear not only, as we have seen, 
 on the cultivation of foxes, but on the still fur- 
 ther extension of the country ; promising Russell 
 he would not rest, nor would he let his friends 
 rest, till he could draw every cover, if no bigger 
 than a blanket, from Torrington to Bodmin. 
 
 In helping Russell to promote these objects, 
 which he did with unflagging zeal and energy, 
 Mr. Harris had the good fortune to be materially 
 supported by a kind maiden aunt, yclept Pene- 
 lope ; and so zealous was she in the cause of 
 fox-hunting that, in her eighty-eighth year, she 
 remained for some hours in her pony-carriage 
 watching Mr. Henry Deacon, the present able 
 Master of the H.H., drawing the Hayne covers, 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 163 
 
 and finding his fox at length in Arraycot 
 Wood. 
 
 Among the best of the hounds selected by 
 
 4^* 
 
 Russell from the Hayne kennels, and afterwards 
 drafted by him, was a litter of five, bred from 
 the Belvoir Rosamond by a noted hound of 
 Russell's, called Mercury ; they were not only 
 pictures to look at in point of shape and beauty, 
 but hard drivers and never idle. Unfortunately, 
 however, they were very small hounds, and did 
 not nearly come up to the standard which Rus- 
 sell, with the prospect before him of seeing his 
 country largely extended, was anxious to raise 
 to twenty-two inches ; so, matchless as they 
 were, both in work and form, the Rosamond lot 
 were sent to Mr. Tout, of Burrington ; while 
 others, for a like reason, went to Col. Lloyd 
 Watkins, of Pennoyre, Mr. George Coham, of 
 Coham, the Rev. E. Clarke, of St. Dominick, and 
 lastly, to the Rev. Pomeroy Gilbert, of Bodmin 
 Priory ; a gentleman, in Russell's pwn words, 
 " blessed with a big heart, given to hospitality, 
 and withal a most accomplished sportsman." 
 
 ' To many a remonstrance against drafting 
 such a valuable lot, Russell would simply quote, 
 if not the very words, at least the opinion of a 
 
1 64 MEMOIR OF 
 
 well-known authority on such matters : "A little 
 hound will go well in some countries : a large 
 hound, if fed to go, will go well in all ; " and 
 he would add emphatically, " that's my opinion 
 too." 
 
 But the sport he had shown, and continued 
 to show, with his little pack had already made 
 his name famous throughout the western coun- 
 ties ; insomuch that many large landed pro- 
 prietors, whose covers pertained neither to Mr. 
 Glubb's hunt, nor to that of Mr. Newton 
 Fellowes, came forward and invited him not 
 only to draw them when he pleased, but to 
 consider them for the future as part and parcel 
 of his own country. Among those may be 
 mentioned Mr. J. M. Woolcombe, of Ashbury, 
 Mr. Savile, of Oaklands, Mr. Tremayne, of 
 Sydenham, and Mr. Harris Arundell, of Lifton 
 Park. 
 
 But, in addition to these valuable acquisi- 
 tions, the trustees of Sir William Molesworth, 
 then a minor, were good enough still further to 
 enlarge his borders by giving Russell per- 
 mission to draw the Tetcott and Pencarrow 
 covers. Again, the Duke of Northumberland's 
 covers at Werrington, the Duke of Bedford's at 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 165 
 
 Endsleigh, those of Mr. Baring Gould, Colonel 
 Fortescue, of Buckland Filleigh, Mr. Luxmoore, 
 Mr. Buckingham, and of Lord Clinton, were all 
 placed at his disposal, while at the same time a 
 general promise was given that foxes, for the 
 future, would receive fair play. 
 
 When the season, then, of 1828 had fairly 
 set in, Russell must have felt as if the morn of 
 a golden age was dawning upon him, so full of 
 promise, so bright and encouraging was the 
 prospect that now lay before him. Like the 
 Colossus of Rhodes, he had one foot on Broad- 
 bury and the other planted on the Bodmin 
 moors ; with not one, but many great rivers 
 between them ; and a country abounding in 
 wild open moors, fairly undulated, and holding 
 a grand scent, over which a hound and a horse 
 could travel together at tip-top pace, while every 
 passage of a run might be seen by the rider ; a 
 country, in fact, such as Meynell and Warde 
 never saw in their happiest dreams. 
 
 Like the "Old Berkeley" of former days, 
 which, when hunted by Mr. Harvey Combe 
 and Mr. Majoribanks, with the famous Harry 
 Oldaker for their huntsman, extended from 
 Barnett to Cirencester, this grand moorland 
 
1 66 MEMOIR OF 
 
 country stretched east and west, literally from 
 Torrington to Bodmin, a distance of upwards 
 of seventy miles, including the vast intervening 
 space, north and south, between Exmoor and 
 Dartmoor. Then, for the convenience of the 
 hounds in so wide a range, they occupied, 
 according to their meets, kennels at Iddesleigh, 
 Hayne, Bodmin, and Pencarrow ; Iddesleigh, 
 of course, being their head-quarters at all other 
 times. 
 
 It would be a long task, and in most cases a 
 downright infliction on the reader, however 
 patient under the recital of mahogany-runs that 
 reader might be, if even a tithe of the brilliant 
 and continuous sport show r n by Russell from 
 1828 to 1832 were recorded in this memoir. 
 
 Nevertheless, in order to represent the man 
 in his true colours, and show that, as a hunts- 
 man, he was equally good all round, a few only 
 of his most remarkable runs brilliant with a 
 burning scent, line-hunting with moderate, or, 
 again, with a cold and catching scent have 
 been selected for that purpose. 
 
 Late in the autumn of 1828, the fixture 
 being Broadbury Castle, Russell and his little 
 ones met with a greeting such as few have 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 167 
 
 received and he could never forget grips of 
 welcome on every side from the large field 
 assembled to hunt with him in that wild country. 
 Conspicuous among the Worthies of Devon 
 and Cornwall were J. M. Woolcombe, of Ash- 
 bury ; " Gallant Tom Phillipps," of Landue ; 
 the late lamented baronet Sir Walter Carew ; 
 W. Cory ton, of Pentillie ; F. and J. Glanville, 
 of Catchfrench ; Arthur Harris, of Hayne ; 
 Captain M. Louis ; Paul O. Treby, of Gooda- 
 moor ; H. Bourchier Wrey, a gentleman always 
 well mounted, and from his spurs to his hat 
 neat as a new pin ; L. Buck, of Moreton ; 
 Whyte, of Pilton ; Erving Clarke, of Buckland 
 Toutsaints ; W. Gurney, of Bratton-Clovelly ; 
 and Moore-Stevens, of Cross. 
 
 Russell, as it happened, was short of horses 
 on that occasion ; but, as luck and good fellow- 
 ship would have it, he was gloriously mounted 
 by a friend in need, Mr. Arthur Harris, 
 who put him on Reuben Apsley by Gains- 
 borough, a chestnut horse, perfect as a fencer 
 and a rare goer in deep ground. Found and 
 away at once ; over the moor at a trimming 
 pace to Hindabarrow, where they threw up. 
 Russell, however, in spite of advice to the con- 
 
1 68 MEMOIR OF 
 
 trary, caught hold of his hounds, and taking 
 them back to a road where he had seen a hound 
 hesitate for a moment, hit off his fox ; held the 
 line for a mile or more steadily along the high- 
 road, then, quitting it, dashed over the moor 
 and raced up to him in Germanswick Wood, 
 bringing him away in view, and running into 
 him on Brockscombe Moor. Time, forty 
 minutes. 
 
 Returning homewards, a fox jumped out of 
 a hedgerow capped with gorse, and away they 
 went at score, over Beaworthy Hollow and 
 Soper's Moor, across Wagaford Water, running 
 from scent to view and rolling him over on the 
 open moor in fifty-two minutes, without the 
 ghost of a check from find to finish. 
 
 Heavy and deep were the moorlands, while 
 the boundary fences were big enough to stop a 
 red-deer. Russell, in each run, went straight 
 away with his leading hounds, taking the fences 
 as they came, and maintaining the lead from 
 first to last ; though Phillipps on Foster, a 
 noted hunter by Gainsborough, Morth Wool- 
 combe on Crown Prince, Treby on Spectre, L. 
 Buck on Alpha, Captain Louis on Harlequin, 
 Cory ton on Raven, Harris on Rosabel, and Mr. 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 169 
 
 H. Bourchier Wrey on Bodkin, struggled hard 
 to catch him ; but in vain. He rode like a 
 man, and handled his hounds, according to the 
 opinion of all present, as no one else in Devon 
 could then have done. 
 
 When congratulated on the place he had 
 kept, he jocularly replied, " No wonder, Arthur; 
 it was your horse ; but they were my own 
 spurs." 
 
 Then, to begin the New Year auspiciously, 
 on the ist of January, 1829, Russell displayed a 
 rare acquaintance with the tactics of a dodging 
 fox ; and a perseverance in pursuing him worthy 
 of a sleuth-hound. Found in Harper Wood, 
 and went away to Abbot's Hill, skirting covers 
 and running a line of inclosures down to the 
 Torridge, which they crossed and recrossed 
 with slow hunting and an indifferent scent ; 
 Russell very patient, but now and again hazard- 
 ing a wide cast to get, if possible, nearer to his 
 fox. At length, the scent mending, he cheered 
 on his hounds, and catching an occasional view, 
 as the fox dodged over his foiled line, he 
 clapped them on from time to time, forced him 
 into fresh ground, crossed the river again, and 
 at last pulled him down gallantly, after a long 
 
i;o MEMOIR OF 
 
 and trying chase of two hours and fifteen 
 minutes. 
 
 Mrs. Russell was out on the above occasion, 
 and held, as usual, a forward place throughout 
 the run ; the patience of her husband and the 
 perseverance of the hounds giving her the 
 greatest delight. 
 
 Cornwall, like its sister county, is famed, as 
 all the world knows, for its hospitality ; and now 
 it was that certain Cornish gentlemen threw 
 open their halls, their covers, and their kennels, 
 to welcome Russell across the border and pro- 
 vide him and his field with a fortnight's hunting 
 twice in the year and such hunting, over those 
 wild moors, the Roughtor and Brown willy wastes 
 the grassy, scent-holding lands of Tetcott and 
 Pencarrow as made the country ring with the 
 sport from Tavistock to the Land's-End. 
 
 " Many a tale," writes Mr. Harris, "is even 
 yet told in the settle of the wayside inn, of the 
 runs that happened during that hunting period 
 of unwonted brilliancy. No farmer within the 
 adjoining or distant parishes, who had a horse 
 or a pony, failed to be present ; labour was com- 
 paratively suspended ; and even the women 
 ' care creature ' put on their Sunday bonnets 
 
THE RE V. JOHN R US SELL. 1 7 1 
 
 and shawls to go and see Mr. Russell find a fox. 
 The houses in the neighbourhood were full of 
 guests, and these hunting meetings possessed 
 rather the character of triumphant ovations than 
 the appearance of ordinary fixtures. Petitions 
 were made by the farmers to arrange the meets 
 so as not to interfere with Tavistock market ; 
 and a sale of stock was not exactly put off, but 
 the advertisement of it was once delayed until 
 after the Russell fortnight." 
 
 These were the Bodmin Meetings, one of 
 the chief promoters of which was that excellent 
 sportsman, the Rev. Pomeroy Gilbert, of Bod- 
 min Priory ; for he it was who secured Russell 
 as his guest, whose kennels and stables were 
 placed entirely at his disposal, and whose in- 
 fluence, had Russell needed it, would have been 
 amply sufficient to insure for him a hearty recep- 
 tion throughout that land. At Pencarrow, too, 
 though Sir William Molesworth was not yet of 
 age, friends assembled from afar, till the house 
 was filled to the rafters ; stalls for two horses 
 being allotted to each guest ; and the kennels, 
 when required, to the use of Russell's hounds. 
 
 The country houses, in fact, vied with each 
 other in the warmth and extent of their hospi- 
 
172 MEMOIR OF 
 
 talities ; insomuch, that the old-fashioned sign 
 of the wayside inn might have been aptly hung 
 over their own doors : " Good entertainment 
 here for man and horse." 
 
 A memorable day was the 1 6th of February, 
 1829, when Russell found three foxes together 
 in Deviock Wood, near Bodmin, and killed all 
 three before the sun set on Brownwilly tors. A 
 brace broke cover at once, going away, like a 
 loving pair, side by side ; while the third stole 
 off without being viewed, and put his head 
 straight for the moor. 
 
 Breaking on their very brushes, the pack 
 stuck to the former, pelting after them like a 
 storm of hail ; when, after a short burst, the 
 foxes separated, and so did the hounds ; Russell 
 sticking to one division and screaming to his field 
 to stop the other. Stop them, indeed ! the moor 
 was before them, the scent breast-high, and the 
 best horse that ever was foaled would fail to 
 head them now in their desperate onward course. 
 
 Mr. Harris on Rosabel, an Irish mare by 
 Poteen, did his best ; so did Colonel Raleigh 
 Gilbert and many others ; but they never came 
 up even to a tail-hound. 
 
 And now occurred an incident which, but 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 173 
 
 for the clever animal under him, might have 
 terminated with serious, if not fatal results, both 
 to Rosabel and her rider. Coming best pace to 
 a high boundary fence, built with stone and 
 coped with turf, the mare faced it gallantly in 
 her stride, bucked upon top, and then, with a 
 vigorous spring, fairly cleared a couple of bul- 
 locks standing for shelter under the moor-wall. 
 Had either of the beasts shifted its position and 
 turned moorwards, a collision must have occurred, 
 which would probably have brought the day's 
 sport to a tragic end. 
 
 Another very remarkable feat of equitation 
 was performed by the same gentleman about 
 this time. On returning, after a day's fox- 
 hunting, to Hayne via Tinhay Bridge, his pro- 
 gress was momentarily arrested by discovering 
 that the bridge, consisting of five arches, was 
 under repair ; four of which were only partially 
 finished, while the space intended for the centre 
 arch was left entirely open ; the river running 
 rapidly and visibly some fourteen feet below. 
 Mr. Harris, happily, was on Skylark, a Foxbury 
 mare bred by Mr. Brendon, of Cazantick, and a 
 perfect hunter. To the horror of the adjoining 
 cottagers, many of whom were watching him 
 
! 
 
 174 MEMOIR OF 
 
 from their doors, Mr. Harris rode over the 
 hurdles that fenced off the bridge ; then, giving 
 the mare her head, she felt cautiously for a sure 
 footing amid the broken masonry, and, collect- 
 ing herself, jumped to the top of the first arch, 
 then on to the second, paused a moment on the 
 brink of the centre arch, as if measuring the 
 exact width of the chasm, then rose coolly and 
 collectedly and cleared it at a bound. The two 
 remaining arches were easily topped ; then 
 came the hurdles, and away. 
 
 Gaylass, Woodbine, Guilty, Comedy, Despe- 
 rate, Madcap, Singer, Daphne, and Mercury 
 are running for blood, and will not be denied. 
 And though Harris and Colonel Raleigh Gilbert, 
 the future hero of many a brilliant campaign in 
 India, and afterwards sp famous at home both 
 in " silk and scarlet," are riding like madmen to 
 stop them, their efforts are utterly vain. Nay, 
 had Jove's winged messenger been there, the 
 god himself could never have stopped those 
 nine merciless hounds, as on they sped, like 
 very demons, in pursuit of their prey. 
 
 In thirty-five minutes the fox that gay 
 Lothario bright as a new guinea when he first 
 broke cover, but now beaten and begrimed with 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 175 
 
 soil, bites the dust, and is torn, as Mr. Whyte- 
 Melville has it, into 
 
 " A hundred tatters of brown." 
 
 But what of Russell ? On bringing back 
 the hounds to Helland Wood there they found 
 him, sticking to his fox, like the Old Man of the 
 Sea to Sinbad the Sailor ; and driving him, like 
 wildfire, through that great cover, as if it was 
 no bigger than a willow-spinney. 
 
 " A fresh hat in the ring," thought Russell, 
 as he greeted the nine hounds thrown in at 
 head : " Now then, Arthur, we shall have him 
 in no time ; " and they killed him in an hour 
 and twenty minutes. 
 
 . On counting the hounds it was found that 
 three of them were missing ; and anon came 
 tidings that a third fox had slipped away, and 
 that those hounds had been seen by a turf-cutter 
 near the Jamaica Inn, streaming away towards 
 Brownwilly. Jemmy Reynolds, kennel-man to 
 Mr. Pomeroy Gilbert, was then despatched after 
 them ; and, on approaching a tor of that wild 
 moor, he heard the three hounds beneath it, 
 marking among the cavernous rocks that lay at 
 its base. In went his terriers ; and Jemmy, 
 
176 MEMOIR OF 
 
 soon handling his fox, brought him home 
 that night, in great triumph, to the Priory 
 kennels. 
 
 A friend, who was present on that occasion, 
 writes thus : " I never knew of a pack finding 
 three foxes at once with scent breast-high 
 and accounting for all three of them, as Russell's 
 did on that day." 
 
 Perhaps there is no more remarkable feature 
 in Russell's long career than the hardihood of 
 frame and power of endurance he has exhibited 
 and that, too, without showing fatigue in 
 riding long distances to cover, hunting his 
 hounds all day, and returning home at night, 
 from points frequently far more distant than 
 even the morning meets. In all the annals of 
 the Chase few men, if any, taking the outside 
 of a horse as their conveyance, have equalled 
 him in this respect. 
 
 The late Sir Tatton Sykes, a man of Her- 
 culean strength and courage, comes nearest to 
 him in the long road distances he was wont to 
 accomplish in the saddle alone. But it will be 
 remembered that Sir Tatton rode only thorough- 
 bred hacks, animals that travelled like oil, and, 
 from their fine condition, did their ten miles an 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 177 
 
 hour with ease to themselves and luxury to 
 their rider. 
 
 His kennel at Eddlesthorpe was at least 
 fifteen miles from his mansion at Sledmere, and 
 he was constantly in the habit of riding thither 
 on hunting mornings before his hounds left for 
 a meet yet many miles farther. It is related of 
 him that, " if asked to go a hundred miles to 
 ride a race, he puts a clean shirt in his pocket, 
 his racing jacket under his waistcoat, a pair of 
 overalls above his leathers, and, jumping upon 
 a thoroughbred tit, arrives there the next day 
 by the time of starting ; and, when the race is 
 over, canters his thoroughbred home again." 
 
 Far different was Russell's case from Sir 
 Tatton's. Subject always to a short stud and 
 indifferent hacks, which not unfrequently were 
 Exmoor ponies, sometimes half-broken and wild 
 as the red-deer, Russell fought his way over the 
 roughest roads in England, starting often be- 
 fore daylight, and returning still oftener long 
 after nightfall, guided by instinct or the stars of 
 heaven to his far-distant home. 
 
 It may well be imagined, therefore, that in 
 the matter of hacks and cross-country roads, 
 Sir Tatton's performances, however long in the 
 
 12 
 
1 78 MEMOIR OF 
 
 saddle, were scarcely more than pleasant exer- 
 cise compared with those of Russell's. Still, 
 Sir Tatton was a wonder ; and in Yorkshire, 
 for many a future day, anecdotes of his kindly 
 but quaint habits, and especially of his manly 
 prowess, not only as a sportsman, but as ai 
 accomplished athlete, will be cherished even as 
 household words. 
 
 Once, on paying his annual visit to London, 
 whither he had ridden, as usual, every yard of 
 the way from Sledmere, he called in at Tom 
 Spring's, in Holborn, and, speaking in the 
 shrill tone which characterized his voice, he 
 begged to be served with a tankard of their 
 oldest and strongest ale. Besides himself and 
 the barmaid, the only other person in the room 
 was a square-set, broad-shouldered man, evi- 
 dently a member of the pugilistic fraternity. 
 On seeing the tankard brought in, the man 
 said, in a mimicking way, " Here, Betsy, bring 
 that ale to me, and take a jug of mild beer to 
 that old woman." 
 
 Sir Tatton turned up his cuffs and buttoned 
 his coat a process which brought the prize- 
 fighter to his legs in one moment ; and at it 
 they went, there and then. 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 179 
 
 In less than ten minutes the ruffian was 
 knocked into a coal-scuttle ; and, having dis- 
 covered his error, refused to continue the un- 
 equal fight any longer. 
 
 " You may now drink the ale, my man," 
 said Sir Tatton ; " and then go home and tell 
 your wife you have been well thrashed by an 
 old woman." 
 
 This is exactly what Russell might have 
 done in the heyday of his Oxford life. 
 
 But now, a few examples will suffice to show 
 how severely long were the distances to cover 
 which Russell habitually performed, both with 
 foxhounds and staghounds, from the first hour of 
 his mastership down to the last year of his life. 
 More than once has he gone, in the grey of 
 the morning, on horseback, from Iddesleigh to 
 Four-hole Cross on the Bodmin moors over 
 fifty miles hunted as long as there was light 
 to see a hound, then, singing, " Dulce, dulce 
 domum," turned his horse's head and ridden, 
 through the gloom of night, back to his 
 home. 
 
 Milestones were never heeded by him when 
 the object was to meet hounds ; indeed, along 
 the wild tracts and by-roads over which his 
 
I So MEMOIR OF 
 
 course usually lay, no such landmarks could 
 have been seen on the longest summer-day. 
 
 During the stag-hunting period of 1877, 
 Russell, in accordance with his custom for 
 the last sixty years, on every occasion but 
 one, rode to Cloutsham Ball and Hawk- 
 combe Head, hunted all day, and returned to 
 his residence at Tordown by eleven o'clock 
 p.m. ; the distance to either meet being about 
 twenty-five miles, more or less, and the road in 
 many parts little better than a mere bridle-path. 
 Long habit, which is second nature, added to a 
 physical frame apparently insensible of fatigue, 
 could alone enable a man in his eighty-second 
 year to do such distances in the saddle, not only 
 without suffering, but with a rare appetite for 
 the next day's sport. 
 
 But a week's work performed in the spring 
 of 1874, when he was only in his seventy-ninth 
 year, has, I believe, no parallel in the records 
 of such feats. He was invited by Admiral 
 and Mrs. Parker to stay a week with them 
 at Delamore, their seat near Ivybridge, on 
 the southern side of Dartmoor, to meet Mr. 
 Mark Rolle, whose hounds were about to 
 hunt that country, by invitation from Mr. 
 
THE RE V. JOHN RUSSELL. 181 
 
 Trelawny, on alternate days in conjunction with 
 his own. 
 
 Russell would unhesitatingly have said 
 " Nolo Episcopari," if even the Palatinate of 
 Durham had been offered to him ; but to enjoy, 
 at the same time, the hospitality of Delamore 
 and the treat of a week's hunting with the 
 crack packs of his two friends was more than he 
 could resist ; so he responded to Mrs. Parker's 
 bidding with a grateful acceptance. 
 
 Accordingly, on Monday, the 23rd of March, 
 he was off betimes, riding part way and doing 
 the rest by rail a distance altogether of more 
 than eighty miles. Arrived in time for the meet, 
 and hunted all day with Mr. Rolle's hounds. 
 
 Tuesday, met Mr. Rolle at Ivybridge. 
 
 Wednesday, Mr. Trelawny, Newnham Park. 
 
 Thursday, Mr. Rolle, Brent Station. 
 
 Friday, Mr. Rolle, Delamore. 
 
 Saturday, Mr. Trelawny, Hanger Down. 
 
 Unfortunately, the weather during the week 
 was not favourable to scent ; consequently, with 
 no lack of foxes, the sport did not prove exactly 
 the dainty dish Mr. Trelawny 's hospitality 
 would have set before his friends. Having 
 earthed their fox within a mile or so of Ivy- 
 
1 82 MEMOIR OF 
 
 bridge on that sixth day, Russell looked at his 
 watch, and, finding it was just two o'clock, he 
 took his hat off to Mrs. Parker, bid her and 
 the field good-bye, and then, homeward bound, 
 steered his course northwards directly over the 
 moor. 
 
 Between his home and Hanger Down, 
 whence he started, the distance is roughly esti- 
 mated at seventy miles ; and as he pricked on 
 merrily, and never quitted his saddle, with the 
 exception of changing his horse midway, till he 
 reached his own stable door at eleven p.m., it 
 cannot be less He then dined heartily, slept 
 well, and the next day, to crown the week's 
 work, performed three full services in his parish 
 with his wonted animation, earnestness, and 
 effect. " Before he had taken anything to eat, 
 however," writes Admiral Parker, " he sat down 
 and filled a sheet of note-paper to my eldest 
 daughter, saying he had tasted nothing, not 
 even a biscuit, since he left our breakfast-table 
 that morning at ten, and that he felt neither 
 hungry, thirsty, nor tired after his day's work. 
 The distance from Hanger Down to Denning- 
 ton," the Admiral adds, " cannot be less than 
 seventy miles." 
 
THE RE V. JOHN R US SELL. 1 83 
 
 But, besides Russell, there were a few others 
 in that country, kindred spirits and friends of 
 his, whom no road-work could daunt when the 
 meet was a good one ; gentlemen who, hunting 
 either with Russell, Mr. Tom Hext, of Restor- 
 mel, or the Landue hounds, were in the habit 
 of riding incredible distances to cover, and re- 
 turning afterwards to their homes at night, 
 because they could find no comfortable sleeping 
 quarters in the neighbourhood of such popular 
 meets as Tetcott, Broadbury Castle, Chapman's 
 Well, or Dosmary Pool. 
 
 Mr. Trelawny, of Coldrennick, who hunted 
 the Dartmoor country for thirty years with such 
 signal success, was notably one of these ; but 
 again, like Sir Tatton Sykes, the hacks he 
 rode Lalage, Melmoth, and Landsend were 
 simply perfect. 
 
 Another was Mr. C. A. Harris, who, to 
 meet hounds near Beaford, started from Pen- 
 tillie Castle at six a.m., and, after a blazing run 
 and a kill in Castle Hill Park, sixty-five miles 
 from Pentillie, returned thither to dinner at half 
 after six, the distance in road-riding alone being 
 about one hundred and fifteen miles. It was 
 done with a couple of hacks, " Meg Merrilies " 
 
1 84 MEMOIR OF 
 
 and " Ladybird," the last by " Anacreon " from 
 Mr. H. Bourchier Wrey's " Ellen," by " Rain- 
 bow," doing her eighteen miles an hour each 
 way. The country-folk, at first sight, must 
 have taken him for Dick Turpin himself ; and, 
 if they did not raise the hue-and-cry, 
 
 " Stop thief! stop thief! a highwayman ! " 
 
 they must have been sharp enough to discover 
 that the mare Mr. Harris rode was a bright 
 bay, and not the veritable " Black Bess," of 
 matchless speed and historic renown. 
 
THE RE V. JOHN R USSELL. 185 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 Has no Regular Whip His Three Horses Termination of the 
 Alliance and Contraction of his Country Mr. J. Morth 
 Woolcombe The Pencarrow Run Mrs. Smith, of For lock 
 The Four Vixen Cubs. 
 
 " When the country is deepest, I give you my word 
 
 'Tis a pride and a pleasure to put him along ; 
 O'er fallow and pasture he sweeps like a bird, 
 And there's nothing too wide, nor too high, nor too 
 strong." 
 
 WHYTE-MELVILLE. 
 
 THE formation of Russell's new and " indepen- 
 dent dynasty," and the grand sport he was able 
 to show with his little pack, gathered though it 
 was from all points of the compass, has been 
 roughly sketched in the foregoing chapters ; and 
 now, it will be asked, by what active and com- 
 petent whip was he supported, or what other 
 efficient aid did he receive to enable him to 
 bring about such satisfactory results ? The 
 question is easily answered : so strongly was he 
 animated by the spirit of " self-help," so well 
 did he know the country and the habits of the 
 
i86 MEMOIR OF 
 
 wild animal he hunted, that, with the exception 
 of casual and very uncertain assistance from 
 his field, and the occasional service of a raw 
 lad a Jack-of-all-work called Sam he literally 
 did the work single-handed, and depended on 
 no one but himself. 
 
 To ride a long distance to cover in the morn- 
 ing, to hunt a pack of foxhounds all day, and 
 at night to jog slowly home with them to their 
 perhaps far-distant kennel, is usually held to 
 be work enough and to spare for any ordinary 
 man ; but if, in addition to these duties, he 
 has to depend mainly on himself to keep them 
 together when they divide, to stop them on 
 riot, and, in fact, to do the work of a whip, or 
 even two whips, besides his own, he need, like 
 Alcides, have a double share of strength, 
 activity, and endurance to do it all, and do it 
 efficiently. 
 
 Nevertheless, this task, the ordinary work 
 of at least two men, imposed as it was upon 
 Russell by that old complaint of his tightness 
 of the chest was not only no toil to him, but a 
 real labour of love one he would have ridden 
 " bare ridge " to perform, nay, sacrificed his last 
 crust to enjoy. 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 187 
 
 Beckford, the Blackstone of hunting law and 
 practice, informs us that " no pack of foxhounds 
 is complete without two whippers-in," and, 
 moreover, adds this testimony to the advantage 
 gained by the help of a good whip : " I 
 think I should have better sport and kill more 
 foxes with a moderate huntsman and an excel- 
 lent whipper-in, than with the best of huntsmen 
 without such an assistant." Again, " No one 
 knows better than you do how essential a good 
 adjutant is to a regiment ; believe me, a good 
 whipper-in is not less so to a pack of fox- 
 hounds." Then, with reference to the duty of a 
 whipper-in, he continues, " While the huntsman 
 is riding to his head-hounds, the whipper-in, if 
 he has genius, may show it in various ways ; he 
 may clap forward to any great earth that may 
 by chance be open ; he may sink the wind to 
 halloo, or mob a fox when the scent fails ; he 
 may keep him off his foil ; he may stop the 
 tail-hounds and get them forward, and has it 
 frequently in his power to assist the hounds 
 without doing them any hurt, provided he has 
 sense to distinguish where he is wanted most. 
 Besides, the most essential part of fox-hunting, 
 the making and keeping the pack steady, 
 
i88 MEMOIR OF 
 
 depends entirely upon him, as a huntsman 
 should seldom rate, and never flog a hound." 
 
 Notwithstanding the importance, then, at- 
 tached by Beckford to the business of a whip, 
 and the high qualifications which should be 
 found in a man acting in that capacity, Russell 
 managed for some time to do well without one, 
 depending, as we have seen, solely on himself 
 and the rough boy already referred to. But, 
 though rough in appearance, Sam had his wits 
 about him, and very soon profited by the 
 lessons in which his master spared no pains to 
 instruct him. For instance, Sam, with a view 
 to his education, was occasionally permitted 
 to join the well-appointed pack of the Hon. 
 Newton-Fellowes, and at such times was espe- 
 cially charged to keep his eye on Stephen, first 
 whipper-in to the latter, and carefully to note 
 his tactics. 
 
 Then, the pastime of the day over, Russell 
 would summon the lad to his dining-room, put 
 him through his facings, and minutely test the 
 result of his day's schooling by asking him such 
 questions as the following : 
 
 " Now, Sam, you saw the second whip 
 riding after and rating those riotous puppies, 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 189 
 
 Fleecer and Frantic, when he was a lanyard 
 or more behind them ; was he right or wrong 
 in doing so, and what would you have done ? " 
 " Got to their head, sir, and then rated 
 them." 
 
 " Quite right, Sam ; but, bear in mind, if 
 you want to punish a hound, you should hit him 
 first and rate him afterwards." 
 
 " Supposing a change takes place in cover, 
 and the hounds divide, which lot should you 
 stop ? " 
 
 " That depends on the huntsman, sir : if he 
 holds to one lot, I should stop the other, and 
 get them forward as fast as I could." 
 
 " That's right, Sam ; and don't forget to do 
 the same by the tail-hounds. Good boy ; you 
 may go now." 
 
 Thus schooled, theoretically as well as prac- 
 tically, Sam, blessed with some genius and 
 strong common sense, became in the course of 
 a few years as useful and clever a whip as ever 
 followed a hound ; so that, with his help and 
 the use of his own significant horn, Russell, not 
 caring a button for show, but only for the sport, 
 could well afford to dispense with the needless 
 encumbrance of a more costly staff. 
 
190 MEMOIR OF 
 
 Some years afterwards John Beale, hunts- 
 man to Sir Walter Carew, and subsequently to 
 the Tiverton Hounds, did wonders single- 
 handed with the latter pack. He had the rare 
 knack, when a fox was up, of getting to their 
 head and keeping his horn going merrily along- 
 side the leading hounds, a signal so well under- 
 stood by the rest of the pack, that he rarely 
 left a hound behind him in breaking away from 
 the deepest covers. Many condemned him as 
 being a tinker in his trade, making more noise 
 than was either necessary or agreeable ; never- 
 theless, the system worked admirably that 
 lively blast and sharp wild cheer of his gathered 
 up the deep-drawing hounds as no whip in the 
 world could have done it, and brought them, 
 out and together, on the very back of their fox ; 
 for nobody knew better than he did that "a fox 
 well found is a fox half killed." 
 
 Thus, without the help of a regular whip, 
 " old John Beale " killed his foxes, and did it 
 handsomely, showing such sport as, so long as 
 that generation lasts, will not readily be for- 
 gotten in the Tiverton country. 
 
 Russell's plan was very much the same his 
 horn was half the battle to him ; but, educated 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 191 
 
 as he had been in the high-class school of Mr. 
 George Templer and Mr. John Codrington, his 
 style, as might be expected, was that of a gen- 
 tleman ; for although quite as energetic as John 
 Beale, and with an eye like a hawk to his head- 
 hounds, no one was ever heard to object either 
 to the lively shake of his horn, or to the soul- 
 stirring echoes of his musical cheer. On the 
 contrary, as a farmer was once heard to say, 
 "It fairly mak'th a man's heart jump in his 
 waistcoat to hear Passon Rissell find his fox ; 
 'twixt he and the hounds, 'tis like a band of 
 music striking up for a dance." 
 
 The history and character of the pack 
 hunted by Russell during his residence at 
 Iddesleigh having been thus briefly recorded, 
 the reader will now expect to learn something 
 of his stud, what his powers as a horseman 
 were, and how he acquitted himself as a rider to 
 hounds. 
 
 To describe him as having been a brilliant 
 performer across country, or to compare him, 
 for instance, with such men as Mr. Assheton 
 Smith, Mr. Lindo, or Lord Alvanley, would be 
 wholly beside the mark ; for, in the first place, 
 Devonshire, with its picturesque scenery, deep 
 
192 MEMOIR OF 
 
 woodlands, hollow combes, and banks averaging 
 ten or twelve feet in height, is a very different 
 country to ride over from the undulating pas- 
 tures and flyable fences of the Midland counties. 
 In the next place, his financial means, to which 
 allusion has already been made, always acting 
 as a drag on his wheel, not only limited his 
 choice, but constrained him to the disadvantage 
 of a short stud, and to the absolute necessity of 
 husbanding its resources, whenever an oppor- 
 tunity enabled him to do so. 
 
 Thus it may with truth be said that in 
 moments of the purest enjoyment, when scent 
 served and hounds were running breast-high, 
 the thought of easing his horse and saving its 
 legs was never absent from his mind ; that was 
 the one Care that sat behind his saddle the 
 spectre that haunted him when the game was 
 at its height the one unpalatable drop in the 
 bumper of enjoyment he was drinking to the 
 dregs ; for the thought of to-morrow would 
 obtrude itself, would make him constantly dis- 
 mount and lead his horse over high banks; when, 
 if his stud had been less limited, he certainly 
 would have taken the quicker, and, to himself, 
 the far easier mode of getting at his hounds. 
 
THE RE V. JOHN RUSSELL. 193 
 
 Russell, therefore, could neither be called a 
 bruiser, nor even a hard man, in the common 
 acceptation of that term ; but his judgment as a 
 horseman could never be impugned ; he had 
 fair hands, a quick eye, a heart in the right 
 place, and so firm and yet easy a seat in the 
 saddle, that no one who looked at him when 
 mounted but would say, " That's a workman, 
 every inch of him." 
 
 Nevertheless, despite the drawback men- 
 tioned, and all other difficulties, Russell very 
 rarely failed to be close to his hounds ; nor, 
 though he lamented his " cumbrous weight " 
 some twelve stone odd did the three brave 
 horses that carried him so safely and well for 
 many a hard season appear to be overtaxed 
 by the work, or show any signs of unnatural 
 decay. They were called Billy, Cottager, and 
 Monkey. 
 
 The last, a chestnut horse, although some- 
 what uncertain in his temper, became a hunter 
 of great renown in the country, doing his work 
 admirably, and coming home gay as a lark after 
 the longest day. The second was an entire 
 horse, very clever at his fences, but very 
 vicious ; he would turn round and bite like a 
 
 13 
 
194 MEMOIR OF 
 
 bull-dog, if the rider gave him the ghost of a 
 chance. Even in his gallop he would occa 
 sionally take a grab at the point of Russell' 
 foot ; and, had he caught it, would have torn 
 the boot ruthlessly from his leg. Twice he 
 seized him by the coat, but fortunately without 
 doing more damage than merely rending the 
 garment. Once indeed he very nearly brought 
 an old friend of Russell's, Dr. George Owen, to 
 serious grief. They were riding in chase side 
 by side the hounds running hard when Cot- 
 tager, in a sudden paroxysm of temper, made 
 a fierce grab at Owen's horse ; but, luckily, 
 instead of catching him with his teeth, he 
 only caught the saddle-cloth and one skirt of 
 the rider's coat. These he tore from the back 
 of both, leaving the worthy doctor the " Owen 
 swift and Owen strong" of that country in the 
 ludicrous predicament of Bailie Nicol Jarvie, 
 when cut down by the dirk of the Highland 
 gillie. 
 
 On another occasion, Russell, when riding 
 Cottager and hunting with a new draft from the 
 Hambledon Hounds, found a fox near Beaford 
 Moor, and pressed him in cover so sharply that 
 he turned short and broke away, unknown to 
 
THE RE V. JOHN R USSELL. 1 95 
 
 him, down wind. Losing sight of the pack, 
 and fancying he viewed a tail-hound at the 
 extreme end of the moor, he rode up, and there 
 found an Irish packman, Peter Dougan by 
 name, standing on a bank, and blown by the 
 chase ; but still staring after it with bated breath 
 and longing eyes. 
 
 " Have you seen the hounds, my man ? " 
 inquired Russell, eagerly. 
 
 " Iss, your honour ; they're jist ahead, run- 
 ning like a peal of bells." 
 
 " Then jump up behind me, pack and all," 
 said Russell, charmed with the man's enthu- 
 siasm and evident love of hunting ; " jump up, 
 and you shall see a bit more of the sport." 
 
 "Bedad, then," said Peter, "that I'll do;" 
 and as Russell adjusted Cottager to the bank, 
 Peter and his pack took their place behind the 
 cantle, notwithstanding the broad meanings 
 displayed by the horse at being thus loaded. 
 He then turned to kick furiously, and never 
 stopped kicking till he had fairly floored Peter 
 and his pack. 
 
 Not long after this adventure, when Russell 
 was riding the chestnut horse Monkey, Peter 
 again met him, and said he had a great favour 
 
196 MEMOIR OF 
 
 to ask him, and that was, that he would allow 
 him to ride that horse over a five-barred gate, 
 with his hands tied behind his back, his face to 
 the horse's tail, and without saddle or bridle. 
 "And," said Peter, entreatingly, "I'll give ye 
 me pack, sir, af ye'll let me do it ; and, by me 
 sowl, 'tis worth five pounds." 
 
 Russell, in a state of wonderment, inquired 
 why he was so anxious to perform such a feat, 
 pointing out the danger of attempting it in such 
 a fashion. 
 
 " Faix, your honour," replied Peter, " I 
 should like to tell 'em what I've done in 
 England when I get back to the ould country." 
 
 Monkey with hounds, and in a good temper, 
 would jump any ordinary five-barred gate ; but 
 otherwise wouldn't rise at a fender. " Had I 
 granted his request," said Russell, " the horse 
 would have broken Peter's neck to a dead 
 certainty." 
 
 For years afterwards the Irishman, on his 
 annual journeys to England, never failed to 
 include in his pack a few silk pocket-handker- 
 chiefs of the blue bird's-eye pattern, which he 
 brought especially for Russell's use ; and it was 
 with no little difficulty that he could be per- 
 
THE RE V. JOHN R US SELL. 1 97 
 
 suaded to take payment for those articles, so 
 devoted an admirer was he of Russell and his 
 hounds. And so well known to the hawking 
 fraternity in Ireland was Russell's name, that 
 not five years ago forty years after Peter 
 Dougan's date the former overtook two Irish- 
 men near South Molton, and, having packs on 
 their backs, he inquired whence they came : 
 " From Ireland, your honour," was the reply ; 
 44 we landed at Ilfracombe last night." 
 
 " Have you any handkerchiefs of this 
 pattern?" asked Russell, showing them a bird's- 
 eye blue one. 
 
 " No, your honour ; they are very scarce 
 now." 
 
 " Well," he replied, " I bought them from a 
 countryman of yours, Pat Dougan by name." 
 
 " Tis Peter Dougan you mane ; and you 
 are Mr. Russell, ef you had them from him. 
 Ah! poor Peter ; he dearly loved hunting, and 
 was always talking about your riverence ; he's 
 been dead many, many years." 
 
 On parting company the packmen volunteered 
 to bring him the handkerchiefs he required ; a 
 promise which, after due time, they did not fail 
 to fulfil. 
 
198 MEMOIR OF 
 
 Now for Billy, the stand-by of Russell's 
 stable, and, as he was wont to declare, the 
 best horse he ever crossed in his life. Billy 
 was a bay pony, fourteen hands high " big as 
 a mountain and long as to-day and to-morrow." 
 He was by a two-year-old grass colt by Twilight, 
 a grandson of Eclipse, out of an Exmoor pony ; 
 and was bred by Mr.Wreford,of Clannaborough, 
 so well known to Devonshire men as one of the 
 most successful breeders of blood stock in the 
 West of England. 
 
 Of the stout and enduring qualities of Billy 
 it is enough to say that Russell never knew him 
 beaten ; nor, as a proof of it, did he ever fail to 
 come home merrily, however long the day, and 
 pick up his corn, to the last grain in the manger. 
 His staying powers in chase, his bank-fencing, 
 and mode of getting through heavy ground, 
 under the weight he carried and the pace he 
 maintained, were truly marvellous. " Russell," 
 writes Mr. Harris, "mounted me once on Billy, 
 and little did I anticipate the great treat in store 
 for me. The meet was at Broadbury Castle ; 
 and thinking him a pony I at first rode him 
 quietly ; but when the hounds began to run, 
 Billy pulled at his snaffie, and letting him go he 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 199 
 
 went with a will right up to the head, as if he 
 had said to himself, ' That's my place, and I 
 mean to keep it.' And so he did ; no bank 
 could stop him ; no pace choke him off ; he 
 could stay all day, and go a cracker through 
 dirt up to the very last. In fact, he was in 
 every respect a steed worthy of his renowned 
 ancestor ; and I much doubt if Wreford ever 
 bred a gamer or a better animal." 
 
 Russell, it is almost superfluous to say, 
 valued him as the apple of his eye ; nay, 
 if he had suffered himself to be tempted by 
 gold, he might at any time have filled his 
 pockets with the price of Billy. But to all offers 
 Russell cried, Avaunt ! and death alone divided 
 the twain. 
 
 Nor was that altogether strictly the case ; for, 
 when the event took place after a faithful servi- 
 tude of more than ten years, Billy's glossy hide, 
 being removed by skilful hands, was sent to a 
 tanner's, and afterwards formed the covering of 
 a most comfortable armchair. The legs and 
 hoofs, the latter beautifully polished and fitted 
 with invisible castors, were all Billy's ; and well 
 might Russell, reclining in the once familiar seat, 
 and perhaps dozing after a long day's work, be 
 
200 MEMOIR OF 
 
 led by fancy's dream to believe that Billy was 
 again under him, sharing the sport together as 
 of yore, and bearing him on eagle-wings to the 
 front of the chase. 
 
 Such a dream would surely be far less 
 unnatural and far happier than the endless 
 inconsequential visions in which men, dipped in 
 Lethe's stream, are so apt to indulge. 
 
 But, though Russell would ofttimes allude 
 with tearful regret to the memory of Billy, he 
 conferred the same honour on Cottager and 
 Monkey ; and there they all stood in the dining- 
 room at Tordown, as if the gods in a moment 
 of compassion had transformed the trio into 
 easy armchairs, determined that Russell and his 
 friends, like Baucis and Philemon, should not 
 be parted even by death. 
 
 Such was his mode of cherishing the remem- 
 brance of the faithful brute companions that had 
 served him so well in life ; and on their part 
 they were still, as it were, doing him grateful 
 service by administering to the comfort of him- 
 self and guests, and reminding them of many a 
 bygone day of thrilling sport and innocent 
 recreation. 
 
 Frederick the Great, we are told, expressed 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 201 
 
 a wish even in his will to be buried with his 
 favourite dogs, and especially near the horse 
 that had carried him so often to victory ; but 
 Russell's fancy for conserving the relics of his 
 mute friends and enjoying their company, still 
 present in the form of armchairs, conveys a far 
 pleasanter notion than that of the old warrior, 
 whose last words were, " I shall be near him 
 very soon." Notwithstanding his will, however, 
 his faithful pets did not " bear him company," 
 for his body received the burial of a Christian, 
 and lies under the pulpit in Potsdam Church. 
 
 Many a pleasantry would Russell pass when 
 inviting a guest to take a seat on one of his old 
 friend's backs. " There," he would say, "give 
 old Cottager a turn ; he'll carry you as easily as 
 a feather-bed ; and he never bites now." Or, 
 " Try Billy ; if he can't go through dirt as he 
 once could, he's up to any weight and won't 
 give you a fall." 
 
 These, however, are later reminiscences of 
 Tordown, the Alpine home to which he removed 
 on quitting Iddesleigh in 1832, and to which he 
 once more recently returned ; hoping, as he then 
 expressed it, to remain there till " the golden 
 bowl be broken, and the spirit shall return unto 
 
202 MEMOIR OF 
 
 God who gave it." But the sketch given of the 
 horses has carried both writer and reader over 
 the scent, and a backward cast never a 
 favourite one of Russell's is now necessary to 
 recover the line. 
 
 Russell had now entered on the third season 
 of his mastership, and so far had literally basked 
 in the sunshine of success ; but in the autumn 
 of 1829, without being an augur, he was not 
 slow to observe that over the Tetcott and 
 Broadbury districts loomed ominous clouds, 
 which portended a break-up of the present 
 arrangements, as well as probably an extensive 
 change in the landmarks of his country. Nor 
 was he kept long in suspense ; for on Friday 
 the 1 3th of November his pack met at Five 
 Oaks for the last time under the old regime. A 
 glorious finale, however, crowned the event ; he 
 killed a brace of foxes, the first in fifty minutes 
 and the next at the end of a long dodging run, 
 in which by the manner he handled his hounds 
 Russell's woodcraft was eminently displayed. 
 
 The circumstances that led to the change 
 were complicated. In the first place the country 
 was much too large for the means at command ; 
 for, owing to the ardent support of the yeomen- 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 203 
 
 farmers, far and wide, foxes had largely increased 
 throughout the land ; consequently the damage 
 fund and the expense of feeing the keepers, etc., 
 rising proportionately, the sum total amounted 
 soon to a serious charge on an exchequer too 
 often inconveniently straitened and never over- 
 flowing. This, perhaps, may be considered the 
 root of the matter. But there was also a general 
 suspicion among Russell's friends that jealousy 
 had a finger in the pie ; and that that feeling, 
 intensified by the impression that the country 
 was insufficiently hunted, prompted a small 
 party, including the Moles worth Trustees, to 
 come forward and suggest the need of another 
 pack of hounds, and therefore the curtailment 
 of Russell's country. 
 
 So the Landue pack, under the command of 
 as gallant a rider as ever crossed a country, Mr. 
 Phillipps, late of the ;th Hussars, better known 
 as Tom Phillipps, was forthwith started, and the 
 Tetcott, Hayne, and Broadbury covers wrested 
 from Russell and handed over to him. He then 
 took formal possession of the country, " the 
 limits of which," writes Russell, " appeared to 
 me to be illimitable ; for they claimed all the 
 covers from Hatherleigh three miles from my 
 
204 MEMOIR OF 
 
 kennels at Iddesleigh to Wade Bridge, ten 
 miles below Bodmin." 
 
 Phillipps, however, met one morning at Grib- 
 bleford Bridge, only two miles from Hatherleigh, 
 found four brace of foxes in the cover a dog, 
 vixen, and three brace of cubs but made a 
 mull of it, called off his hounds in disgust and 
 went home, a distance of thirty miles at least to 
 his kennel. After some time it was communi- 
 cated to Russell that Phillipps would never draw 
 those covers again ; so, as the country was a 
 choice one, comprising the fine moorland dis- 
 trict of Broadbury, the wildest in the West of 
 England, Russell bethought him how he could 
 best recover his footing and bring about the 
 desirable end of securing it for his own. 
 
 A turn in his favour by the wheel of fortune 
 soon gave him a suitable opportunity. Mr. J. 
 Morth Woolcombe happening to join him one 
 morning, " they found," in Russell's words, " a 
 right real Dartmoor Hector, and away he went 
 for his native moorland, straight as a bee-line ; 
 but he never set foot on it, for we ran into him 
 about a mile short of his haunts. Just before 
 we killed him, he crossed some enclosures, and 
 the hounds coming back to us, I held up my 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 205 
 
 hands and said, * Stand still, gentlemen, pray ! 
 the fox is in this field.' It was not two acres 
 and it was plough. 
 
 " ( Nonsense!' cried Woolcombe ; ' we should 
 see him if he were.' 
 
 " ' He is here, I tell you, if I know my 
 hounds.' And in a moment they seized him 
 within a few yards of his horse's feet. 
 
 "His delight was unbounded ; he begged 
 me as a particular favour to go home by way of 
 Ashbury, invited the whole field into the hall, 
 drew cork after cork of champagne, toasted the 
 little Iddesleigh pack and their master, and pro- 
 mised similar hospitality whenever they killed 
 a fox within reach of his domain. 
 
 " He kept his word too up to a certain time, 
 when, for some reason I never could fathom, he 
 sent his brother Robert over to Iddlesleigh to 
 negotiate for the purchase of my whole pack. I 
 was not at home ; but when I returned to dinner, 
 Mrs. Russell said, ' Robert Woolcombe has been 
 here all the morning, waiting to see you.' 
 
 " ' And did he say what he wanted ? ' I 
 inquired. 
 
 "' His brother is anxious to buy your hounds, 
 and sent him over to treat for them ; they think 
 
206 MEMOIR OF 
 
 that, as a clergyman, you ought not to keep 
 them.' 
 
 " * They are very kind neighbours,' I said, 
 ' and I fully appreciate their good feeling ; but 
 at the same time I hope I do them no wrong if 
 I altogether mistrust their motives.' 
 
 " ' Robert is coming again to-morrow,' con- 
 tinued Mrs. Russell, ' and is bent on seeing 
 you.' 
 
 " Before the morrow arrived, however, being 
 forewarned as to the object of his visit, I was 
 fully prepared with my answer. 
 
 " The next day he accordingly came ; and, 
 as he took me by the hand, I said, ' Well, 
 Robert, and pray what's your pleasure ? ' 
 
 " ' I came to buy your hounds,' he responded, 
 bluntly ; ' what's your price ? ' 
 
 "'Three hundred guineas,' I replied, 'for 
 all but five couple, which I shall keep.' 
 
 "'A bargain,' he said; "I'll take them. 
 But what are you going to do with the five 
 couple ? ' 
 
 " ' Keep them as a nucleus for another pack.' 
 " ' Oh, that will never do,' he said ; ' we 
 want the country ; the hounds are no use to us 
 without it.' 
 
THE RE V. JOHN RUSSELL. 207 
 
 " ' Then you shall have neither, Bob,' was 
 my decisive reply. 
 
 " And so ended the negotiation. We then 
 parted, and I went on hunting the country and 
 killing the wild animal as heretofore." 
 
 It was a real grief to Russell for many a day 
 afterwards to discover, as he very soon did, that 
 foxes in the Broadbury country became scarcer 
 and scarcer yearly, and that at length Mr. 
 Woolcombe went so far as to wage open war 
 against the whole race by ordering his keepers 
 and tenants to trap, shoot, and destroy every fox 
 they found bred or travelling over his estate. 
 And so rigorously was this mandate executed, 
 that a paragraph appeared in the papers an- 
 nouncing the number of vixens and cubs he had 
 destroyed, and calculating that he had rid the 
 country of no less than two hundred and fifty 
 foxes, great, small, and forthcoming. Nay, 
 large placards were printed at Okehampton and 
 posted in the neighbourhood, setting forth the 
 above gross statement, and justifying the 
 slaughter as one of meritorious service to the- 
 whole community. 
 
 But although at the time it was denounced 
 as a most unneighbourly proceeding on the part 
 
208 MEMOIR OF 
 
 of Mr. Woolcombe, there are good grounds now 
 for believing that he was, in truth, influenced by 
 conscientious scruples only, rather than by any 
 ill-will to Russell ; for in speaking of him apart 
 from his profession, he was wont to express his 
 unbounded admiration of his manly power and 
 pre-eminent ability in all that pertained to the 
 science of woodcraft. 
 
 Great indeed was the indignation, especially 
 of the hunting community, at this wholesale 
 massacre of the foxes. One Jack White, a 
 horse-dealer, is said to have upbraided Mr. 
 Woolcombe, who was a very tall man, to his 
 very face. 
 
 " Let me tell you, sir," said Jack, " that 
 you're six feet four of the very worst stuff as I 
 ever seed wrapped up in one bundle. Gude 
 morning, sir." 
 
 It was not without good reason, therefore, 
 that Mr. Phillipps, either from a mistrust in the 
 friendship of the cover-owners, or from a manly 
 feeling that he would be doing Russell an ill- 
 service by continuing to hunt that country, 
 declined, after the day at Gribbleford Bridge, to 
 bring his hounds again to that locality, and 
 thenceforth devoted himself exclusively to the 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 209 
 
 region round about Tetcott and Pencarrow. 
 One thing is certain, that in every transaction 
 with respect to Russell and the Broadbury 
 country, Mr. Phillipps's conduct was always 
 straightforward and altogether unimpeach- 
 able. 
 
 Early in the spring of 1831 the young 
 baronet, Sir William Molesworth, then in his 
 twenty-first year, having invited a large party of 
 gentlemen to meet Phillipps and the Landue 
 hounds at Pencarrow for a fortnight's hunting, 
 the house was filled to the rafters. Two stalls 
 were allotted to each guest, and hacks ad 
 libitum found room in the stables of the neigh- 
 bouring tenants. The few survivors of that 
 meeting and now, alas, they are very few 
 will never forget the i6th of February in that 
 fortnight, when a fox was found at Polbrock, 
 near the riverside, every hound breaking away 
 almost on his back, bringing him over the paling 
 into Pencarrow Park, and by the Roman mounds 
 away to Helland Wood ; thence tearing on with 
 a burning scent over the virgin soil of the vast 
 rough enclosures, they carried a grand head, 
 and, dashing five or six couple abreast over the 
 big boundary fence, broke out on the moor and 
 
 14 
 
210 MEMOIR OF 
 
 on to the Launceston and Bodmin road, where 
 they dropped into slow hunting and then threw 
 up. 
 
 The road was of granite, hard as iron and 
 dry as brickdust ; but a hound called Memory, 
 with nose well down, held on, faintly feathering 
 here and there, yet still on the rest of the 
 hounds, with heads up, being hopelessly at fault. 
 Phillipps, growing impatient and grasping his 
 horn, was turning to cast them towards the 
 Torrs northwards, when Russell, keeping his 
 eye on Memory, held up his hand and exclaimed, 
 " Do, pray, give her time. There ! she has it, 
 I tell you, and will fling her tongue in half a 
 minute, if you'll let her alone." 
 
 But Phillipps would make his cast, while 
 Russell and Mr. Pomeroy Gilbert remained 
 stationary, intent only upon Memory, as she 
 still persevered steadily on the road. At length, 
 a patch of wet soil giving her a chance, she 
 dropped her stern, and at the same time throw- 
 ing her tongue, dashed over the heather-bank 
 on to Temple Moor and away. Russell's scream 
 was too thrilling, too rapturous, to describe. 
 Away, away, over that grand waste of heather 
 a thorough wilderness ; not a vestige of man ; 
 
THE RE V. JOHN RUSSELL. 2 1 1 
 
 not a solitary patch of gorse ; not even a twig 
 to shelter a wild animal for leagues. 
 
 Racing him to the boundary fence of the 
 moor above Trebartha the hounds caught a view, 
 and instantly as if by a stroke of magic they 
 and the fox vanished from the scene. It seemed 
 to the foremost riders, Mr. Charles Trelawny 
 on Oswestry, Mr. Phillipps on Foster, Mr. 
 Harris, Mr. Cory ton, and Mr. Tom Hext, who 
 was the first to view him, that the earth had 
 opened her jaws and swallowed them alive ; and 
 such was the case : the shaft of an old mine lay 
 open, and they had fallen 
 
 " Into utter darkness, deep engulphed." 
 
 The fox, indeed, with the activity of a wild 
 beast, had clambered on to a broken beam ; but 
 three of the leading hounds were swimming 
 about in the dark water at the bottom of the 
 mine, some seven fathoms deep ; while the rest 
 of the pack had stopped short of the abyss and 
 scrambled out. 
 
 " Gone to ground with a vengeance," ex- 
 claimed Phillipps, with bitter emphasis, dreading 
 the loss of his hounds. 
 
 In a few minutes some miners appeared on 
 
212 MEMOIR OF 
 
 the ground ; but not a man of them would go 
 down, not daring to face the dangers of the 
 decayed framework in the precipitous shaft. 
 Not so, however, " Jack Russell," who, with a 
 knotted rope in one hand and his hunting-whip 
 in the other, lowered himself, amid a shower of 
 loose stones and earth, to the beam on which 
 the fox was crouching. Then running the 
 thong through the keeper of his whip, and 
 fixing the noose round the animal's neck, he 
 shouted aloud, " Haul away, I've got him ! " 
 and in half a minute he and the fox were landed 
 again on terra firma. 
 
 11 Save him, Phillipps ; he is a gallant fellow 
 and deserves his life," said Russell, begging 
 hard for a reprieve. 
 
 But Phillipps sternly said, "No;" and tossed 
 him to the hounds. 
 
 Then, to save the three brave brutes now 
 struggling in the pit from a longer immersion, 
 Russell was again prepared to go to the rescue, 
 had not Colonel (afterwards Sir Walter Raleigh 
 Gilbert) persuaded a miner, by the bribe of a 
 capfull of silver, to go down ; and secured by a 
 rope round his waist, to bring up the hounds, 
 one by one, safely "to bank." 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 213 
 
 It was a grand run throughout : sixteen 
 miles as the crow flies measured on the map 
 and the last seven over the wild open moor 
 without the shadow of a fence or check from 
 first to last. 
 
 Russell to the end of his life spoke of it as 
 one of the finest things he had ever witnessed ; 
 but the cream of the run, the finishing touch 
 that brilliant passage over the Bodmin Moor 
 was due to him and him alone. 
 
 Of the many queer incidents that befell him 
 in those early days, the one he met with at 
 Porlock is by no means the least amusing ; and, 
 as it illustrates the feeling of a strong partisan 
 in favour of him and his hounds, it shall be told 
 as nearly as possible in his own words. 
 
 "In the spring of 1830 I took my little pack 
 down to Porlock to enjoy a week's hunting in 
 the open and extensive commons in that locality ; 
 and rare sport we had day after day both with 
 fox and hare. I was accompanied by the Rev. 
 J. Pomeroy Gilbert, there to be joined by the 
 Rev. H. Farr Yeatman, two of the best and 
 most accomplished sportsmen I ever met, to 
 whose names let me add that of George 
 Templer, of Stover ; such a trio they were as 
 
214 MEMOIR OF 
 
 the world has rarely seen together in the 
 hunting-field. 
 
 " On our return from the hills one evening, 
 Mrs. Smith, our hostess at the Ship Hotel, 
 where we were staying, thus accosted me 
 
 " ' If you plaise, Mr. Rissell, that old scamp, 
 Squire Tamlyn, as they call 'en, hath a been 
 down here to forbid you from hunting over his 
 property. Now hearken to me, sir, and us'll 
 tackle 'en, as all sich varmint ouft to be tackled. 
 Ask 'en to come here and dine with ee to- 
 morrow, and when he'th a sot dow r n comfortable 
 afore the fire, give the t'other gentlemen a wink 
 to leave the room, and I'll come in quietly behind 
 'en, seize his both arms, and then do you wallop 
 'en over the face and eyes till he sings out for 
 mercy. I'll never let 'en go, mind, till you've a 
 finished with 'en ; and that I'll promise ye.' 
 
 " At this point I ventured to remonstrate 
 with her, urging, first, that it would be a gross 
 breach of hospitality, and then that a summons 
 for the assault would be sure to follow. 
 
 " ' But,' exclaimed the woman, ' the magis- 
 trates shan't get a word out of me to convict 
 you, sir, if he doth get a summons ; and what's 
 more, I'll tell 'em two or three such pretty 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 215 
 
 stories about 'en, as he won't like to hear ; and 
 there the matter '11 end.' 
 
 "The next day," says Russell, with the 
 view of propitiating Mr. Tamlyn, I wrote him a 
 very polite note inviting him to dine with us ; 
 but he declined the honour, much to the disgust 
 of Mrs. Smith, who consoled herself with these 
 words, 'Well, never mind, I'll give it to 'en 
 myself the first time I set eyes on the mean 
 old scamp.' 
 
 "And," continued Russell, "I have reason 
 to believe that she absolutely kept her word ; 
 for she was a veritable termagant a tigress in 
 petticoats." 
 
 One result of the week's sport being some- 
 what remarkable, it may interest the reader 
 to have it in Russell's words : " The very 
 day Tamlyn went to Porlock to forbid my 
 hunting, I found a fox in the heath on Lucat 
 Common, his property. Thinking it was a 
 vixen, I rode up to the bush, out of which she 
 jumped, and, behold ! curled up in a warm nest 
 were four live cubs. I tied my handkerchief to 
 a bush hard by, and rode after the pack as fast 
 as my horse could carry me. But it was a 
 blaze of scent all the way ; and in thirty minutes, 
 
2i5 MEMOIR OF 
 
 to my great annoyance, they ran into and killed 
 poor little Vicky. I then returned to her ken- 
 nel, took up the cubs all four vixens and sent 
 them by Bat Anstey to Iddesleigh, fifty miles 
 away. An earth was made for them under 
 Halsdon, Mr. Purse's residence ; and in and 
 around that earth they remained, being ear- 
 marked, and thriving well, till the following 
 October, when suddenly they disappeared, and 
 I never had the good luck to find one of them 
 again with hounds. 
 
 " Six years afterwards, I met the late Mr. 
 Newton, of Bridestowe, in Barnstaple, and he 
 asked me if I had ever ear-marked describing 
 the mark any foxes and lost sight of them. 
 
 " ' Yes,' I said; 'four cubs, all vixens.' 
 * Then,' he replied, ' I found them last March in 
 some brakes near Broadwood-Widger, twenty- 
 five miles below Halsdon ; had good runs with 
 each, and killed all four.' " 
 
THE RE V. JOHN RUSSELL. 2 1 7 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 Removes to Swymbridge His Kindness to the Gipsies St. 
 Hubert's Hall The Vine Draft The Chumleigh Club The 
 Bishop of Exeter and the Charges against Russell Bishop 
 revokes the Curate's License Mr. Trelawny on the Chum- 
 leigh Meetings. 
 
 " His house was known to all the vagrant train, 
 He chid their wanderings, but relieved their pain ; 
 Careless their merits or their faults to scan, 
 His pity gave ere charity began." 
 
 GOLDSMITH. 
 
 MR. RUSSELL had resided just six years at 
 Iddesleigh, when, in 1832, the prospect of pre- 
 ferment being held out to him, he was induced 
 to remove to Tordown, in the parish of Swym- 
 bridge ; a lone country-house overhanging a 
 picturesque combe, and approached by a steep 
 by-road leading from that village to Exmoor. 
 To Mrs. Russell, especially, the change proved 
 a most welcome one, inasmuch as it now brought 
 her back to the scenes of her early youth, again 
 to dwell among her own people ; Dennington 
 House, the seat of Admiral and Mrs. Bury, 
 
2i8 MEMOIR OF 
 
 being situated on the opposite side of the valley 
 in the same parish. 
 
 In 1833, soon after he had planted his 
 garden and taken full possession of Tordown, 
 the Perpetual Curacy of Swymbridge and Land- 
 key became vacant, and the benefice being in 
 the gift of Whittington Landon, then Dean of 
 Exeter, Russell was appointed to it in that year. 
 
 Appropriate enough was the title of " Per- 
 petual Curacy " to such a benefice ; for the 
 whole annual income derived by the incumbent 
 amounted to less than ^180, out of which sum 
 he was not only required to provide and pay a 
 curate for the annexed parish of Landkey, but 
 to meet perpetual calls from a large population 
 of poor parishioners, who naturally in the first 
 place looked to him for. help in their numerous 
 emergencies. To have called it a " living " 
 would have been simply a comedy ; for, when 
 these and various other liabilities incidental to 
 Church property had been deducted, the resi- 
 due might be reckoned as nil, or even as some- 
 thing less than that, for the incumbent to 
 live on. 
 
 Rightly, too, was it thus named in another 
 sense ; for there Russell was planted for forty- 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 219 
 
 five years and so far he may fairly be con- 
 sidered the Perpetual Curate of Swymbridge. 
 During that period, however, the parish has 
 undergone various and important changes for 
 the better ; its annexation with Landkey, for 
 instance, has been severed ; new schools have 
 been established and endowed ; while, at a dis- 
 tant hamlet called " Traveller's Rest," a com- 
 modious chapel has been built, the cost of which 
 depended on means mainly raised by Russell's 
 exertions. 
 
 " When I was inducted," Russell writes, " to 
 this incumbency, in 1833, there was only one 
 service here every Sunday morning and even- 
 ing alternately with Landkey, whereas now, I 
 am thankful to say, we have four services every 
 Sunday in Swymbridge alone." To this it may 
 be added that the fine old church of that parish, 
 described by Mr. Pearson, A.R.A., of Harley 
 Street, as " one of the most interesting churches 
 he ever saw," has been admirably restored by 
 that gentleman at a cost of nearly ^3000. 
 
 Russell's great influence among the yeomen 
 and tenant-farmers of North Devon, and the 
 genial spirit with which he managed them, as a 
 Master of Hounds, has been already referred to 
 
220 MEMOIR OF 
 
 in a former chapter ; a kind word from him 
 doing more to secure their good-will, and pro- 
 mote the cause of fox-hunting, than the Bank 
 of England notes of less popular men. But, if 
 little has hitherto been said on the subject of 
 that inner circle his own parish over which 
 he has presided for so many years, i^must not 
 thence be inferred that he lacked at home the 
 honour he found abroad ; for no man has been 
 more venerated, nay, loved, by the poor among 
 whom he has ministered than Mr. Russell. And 
 with good reason, too ; for, in season or out of 
 season, no one of them in distress ever appealed 
 to him in vain. 
 
 Nor did the wandering tribes of gipsies that 
 were wont to sojourn a while on the waste spots 
 in his parish that race of Ishmael of whom it 
 is said, " his hand shall be against every man, 
 and every man's hand against him," form an 
 exception to that rule. 
 
 Instead of persecuting them as trespassers 
 and plunderers, by impounding their donkeys, 
 compelling them to strike their tents at a mo- 
 ment's notice, driving them and their children 
 from pillar to post, and treating them more like 
 wolves than human beings, he never failed to 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 221 
 
 protect and befriend them, whenever he thought 
 they were unmercifully or even unfairly used. 
 It was one of the old gipsy regulations of the 
 Kirk Yetholme tribe, Sir Walter Scott tells us, 
 to respect, in their depredations, the property 
 of their benefactors ; so these North Devon 
 gipsies, in return for Russell's kindness, were 
 always scrupulously careful to give him no cause 
 to complain of their presence, or regret his own 
 forbearance ; and whatever their shortcomings 
 may have been with respect to other property, 
 his, at least, never suffered from their depreda- 
 tions in any way. Often has he been heard to 
 say, "to the best of his belief he never lost a 
 head of poultry, nor even an egg, by the hands 
 of the gipsies." 
 
 But their appreciation of his kindness was 
 more than negatively shown ; they took active 
 steps and a signal opportunity of proving their 
 devotion to Russell by coming forward, of their 
 own accord, to protect his dwelling-house, when 
 they had reason to believe it was threatened by 
 burglars. A desperate gang had infested the 
 neighbourhood for some time, the houses of the 
 clergy having been made the chief object of 
 their depredations, far and near. At length it 
 
222 MEMOIR OF 
 
 was whispered about that Russell's, which had 
 so far escaped, would be the next to suffer, 
 the gipsies not being the last to hear the 
 rumour. 
 
 The alarm, however, after some time passed 
 off; and one day, as Russell was riding near 
 Stonecross, on his way to Exmoor, he met Seth, 
 the stalwart son of the King of the Gipsies, and 
 thus accosted him : " Is it true, Seth, that you 
 and your men, hearing that my house was likely 
 to be attacked, have been keeping watch over 
 it for many nights together ? " 
 
 " Quite true, sir ; and let me tell you, if we 
 had caught them on your premises, they would 
 never have gone home alive. ' 
 
 But, long before that event happened, Rus- 
 sell had secured the good-will of the Romanies 
 for ever by a somewhat risky transaction on his 
 part. He was riding down to Haccombe on a 
 visit to Sir Walter Carew, and passing by Part- 
 ridge Walls, near Eggesford, was hailed by a 
 blacksmith, who, coming out of his forge, begged 
 his advice under the following circumstances : 
 " If you please, Mr. Russell," he said, " here's a 
 gipsy who wants to buy my black mare ; but he 
 has no money in his pocket, and wants me to 
 
THE RE V. JOHN R US SELL. 223 
 
 trust him. Now, I can't afford to part with her 
 and lose the money ; so what had I better do ? " 
 
 The gipsy was standing by at the time ; 
 and, as Russell fixed his gaze upon the open 
 and manly face of the swarthy young fellow, he 
 felt convinced by its expression that his pur- 
 pose was an honest one, and, strong in that 
 conviction, he asked him his name, putting a 
 further question or two to him before he gave 
 the blacksmith an answer. 
 
 On hearing his name, Russell said, "Then 
 you are the man who was encamped last year 
 with your wife near Iddesleigh, soon after your 
 marriage ? " 
 
 " No, sir ; that was my brother." 
 
 " If I pass my word for the money, will you 
 pay it ? " 
 
 " Yes, sir, I will," he replied unhesitatingly. 
 
 "Then," said Russell, turning to the black- 
 smith, " you may look to me for the money ; if 
 he don't pay you, I will." 
 
 The blacksmith appeared satisfied ; but, still 
 anxious to clench the nail properly, he warned 
 Russell that he certainly should come upon him 
 if the gipsy failed to keep his word. 
 
 About a week afterwards, Russell was again 
 
224 MEMOIR OF 
 
 passing the blacksmith's forge, and, reining up 
 his horse, he inquired if the money had been 
 paid by the gipsy. 
 
 " Yes, sir," he replied ; " every penny of it." 
 In becoming " surety for a stranger," and 
 that stranger a gipsy and a horse-dealer, it is 
 only too wonderful that he did not "smart for 
 it " : but it was just the reverse ; he gained by 
 that and other acts of kindness to his race, the 
 good-will and gratitude of the whole "vagrant 
 train." Nor was their gratitude a matter of 
 sentiment only, for the King of the Gipsies, a 
 very old man, falling ill, and feeling that his 
 earthly hours were drawing to a close, ex- 
 pressed a last wish that a charm he had long 
 worn and prized greatly it was a silver Spanish 
 coin, Temp. Car. III. Rex Hispanise should 
 be handed over to Mr. Russell, in token of the 
 sympathy he had ever shown to him and his 
 tribe. He left him also, as a legacy, his royal 
 rat-catcher's belt ; and on his death-bed sent 
 him a message, begging he might be buried 
 in Swymbridge Churchyard by Mr. Russell 
 himself. 
 
 The patriarch's chief legatee could scarcely 
 do less than comply with so simple a request ; 
 
THE RE V. JOHN RUSSELL. 2 2 5 
 
 and accordingly in that God's-acre, where " the 
 rude forefathers of the hamlet sleep," he now 
 lies ; and there, to his memory, his people have 
 erected a substantial monument, acknowledging 
 the receipt and marking the last resting-place of 
 his borrowed earth. He was buried on a Satur- 
 day afternoon, Russell exacting a promise from 
 his son Seth, that he and his camp would not 
 move on the Sabbath-day. But, on the follow- 
 ing Monday, Russell having occasion to travel 
 moorwards, found them on a waste place near 
 Stonecross, four miles from the encampment 
 they had occupied on the Saturday. 
 
 " How's this ? " said he, hailing the young 
 gipsy, who stepped out to meet him ; " you pro- 
 mised me not to move till this morning ; and 
 you must have come here yesterday. I thought 
 I could trust you, Seth." 
 
 " So you can, sir ; but we couldn't help it. 
 
 Mr. " (a neighbouring magistrate) "sent a 
 
 constable to order us off directly, or he said we 
 should all be locked up in jail." 
 
 While they were yet speaking, a handsome 
 young gipsy woman, apparently in the bloom of 
 health and vigour, came forth from one of the 
 tents, and, with a prophetic air, said, " Good 
 
 15 
 
226 MEMOIR OF 
 
 morning, Mr. Russell ; the next person you bury 
 will be myself." And on that day week, as the 
 Swymbridge register will testify, he buried her. 
 She was the old king's daughter. 
 
 Now, Russell was neither a superstitious nor 
 a very credulous man the Vicar of Wakefield 
 and he in that respect could scarcely be more 
 dissimilar ; but, from that day, he was tainted, 
 if not impressed, with the belief that something 
 of the Cassandra foresight the power of look- 
 ing into futurity, that abyss of impenetrable 
 darkness is possessed by the gipsy race ; at all 
 events, prevalent as such an idea has been 
 among men of the strongest minds and their 
 name is legion it may be doubted if many, or 
 any, could give better grounds for their phan- 
 tasy than Russell. 
 
 Testimonials, in the form of silver goblets, 
 salvers, and such-like presents, are far from 
 being always a proof that the recipients have 
 really deserved them ; nor, though Russell has 
 had in his day a fair share of such honours, 
 would they now be referred to if one of a very 
 unusual and remarkable character had not been 
 conferred on him some time before he had fairly 
 settled at Tordown. 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 227 
 
 Mr. C. A. Harris, of Hayne, animated by a 
 strong and unqualified admiration of Russell's 
 powers, both as a huntsman and a man, con- 
 ceived the notion of doing him honour by a plan 
 of singularly novel and unique design. It hap- 
 pened that, after a sharp burst with a fox in 
 that country, Russell ran him to ground in an 
 old quarry near Hayne, the excavation of which 
 had been long discontinued. Whether he killed 
 him or not, deponent sayeth not ; but it is on 
 record that from that date Mr. Harris deter- 
 mined to convert the quarry into a rustic temple 
 in honour of Russell and his friends. 
 
 The quarry, overhung by old trees and 
 situated on a dry rocky bank, was first hollowed 
 out and paved with blocks of Dartmoor granite ; 
 an entire British village, including two or three 
 kistvaens being utilized for that purpose. 
 Then, round the circular enclosure were formed, 
 out of the same relics, twenty-two stalls, over 
 each of which the carved head of a fox and an 
 heraldic banner with a motto appropriate to 
 each occupant were displayed, the name and 
 residence of the knight being added thereto. 
 
 A fete of inauguration, including all the chief 
 families of the district, took place at the time, 
 
228 MEMOIR OF 
 
 and from that day St. Hubert's Hall has been 
 the rendezvous of many a picnic party, attracted 
 thither no less by the picturesque scenery than 
 by the singular honour done to fox-hunting. 
 
 It was only a short time before Russell had 
 made up his mind to quit Iddesleigh, the fame 
 of his little pack having exceeded all expecta- 
 tion, that a break occurred in his hunting life, 
 which created a general sensation, not only 
 among his own devoted followers, but among 
 others who only knew of his intense delight in 
 the company of hounds. He parted with the 
 whole lot, lending them, at least for a time, to 
 Mr. T. Hext, of Restormel Castle, a gentleman 
 in whose hands he well knew they would suffer 
 no harm. 
 
 The pressure of a few friends, who probably 
 believed they were doing him good service, had 
 at length prevailed, and he was forced, as it 
 were, at the point of the bayonet, to adopt their 
 well-meant advice. But it was a trial and a 
 wound to his feelings, the keenness of which 
 Time, that soother of all sores, w r as ineffectual 
 to heal. 
 
 For two long years this interregnum a 
 period of constrained inactivity and bondage, to 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 229 
 
 one of his muscular habits weighed like an 
 incubus on his spirits, and clogged the wheels 
 of his life with the daily want of something 
 he missed, and of something more to do. The 
 tedium, in fact, had become almost unbearable, 
 when one day, as he was leisurely inspecting the 
 blossom on his apple trees and calculating their 
 autumn crop reckoning his chickens before 
 they were hatched a surprise awaited him for 
 which he was little prepared. 
 
 Six and a half couple of strong young 
 hounds, a draft from the Vine, had been sent 
 to him from Mr. Harry Fellowes, with an 
 intimation that " they had all passed the dis- 
 temper, and that no better blood had ever 
 tackled a Devonshire fox." " There they stood," 
 said Russell, " alone in my kennel the greatest 
 beauties my eye had ever rested on looking 
 up in my face so winningly, as much as to say, 
 ' Only give us a trial, and we'll not disappoint 
 you,' that I mentally determined to keep the lot 
 and go to work again." 
 
 But the same friends were still at hand to 
 counteract the temptation ; and so great was the 
 pressure put upon him, that again he consented 
 with a heavy heart to abandon his design, and 
 
2 3 o MEMOIR OF 
 
 send the six and a half couple after the rest 
 down to Restormel. 
 
 Accordingly, they were actually taken out of 
 kennel to be so forwarded, when Mrs. Russell, 
 witnessing her husband's dejection at parting 
 with them, interposed and said, " Then they 
 shan't go, John, if you don't like it. I don't see 
 why you shouldn't have your amusement as well 
 as other people." So back they went into 
 Russell's kennel, and from that day he con- 
 tinued to keep hounds till 1871, when he parted 
 with his last pack to Mr. Henry Villebois, of 
 Marham Hall, Norfolk, a gentleman well known 
 to the world as an old master of hounds and a 
 distinguished sportsman. 
 
 It is related of the late eminent Bishop of 
 Exeter, Henry Phillpotts, that soon after his 
 appointment to that diocese in 1831, he was 
 travelling on a visitation tour through the north 
 of Devon, and seeing a pack of hounds in full 
 cry, and a large number of gentlemen in black 
 coats crossing the road in close pursuit, he 
 turned to his chaplain, and said in a solemn 
 tone, " Alas ! this neighbourhood must have 
 been visited by some fearful epidemic. I never 
 saw so many men in mourning before." 
 
THE RE V. JOHN R US SELL. 23 1 
 
 The chaplain knew the country better than 
 the bishop, and said nothing; while he identified 
 the mourners, one after the other, as brethren 
 of his own cloth, and personal friends. But not 
 long did that keen and far-sighted prelate remain 
 unacquainted with the habits of his clergy in this 
 respect ; and although for years he did all in his 
 power to discountenance and suppress the prac- 
 tice, the love of hunting was too strong even for 
 him ; it still flourished like a plant indigenous 
 to the soil deep-rooted and ineradicable. 
 
 Russell, as might be expected, became the 
 especial object of his fatherly solicitude ; he held 
 what is called " a chapter living," and besides, 
 he was known by the bishop to be an able and 
 popular preacher, and as such, it was only 
 natural that his diocesan should be doubly 
 anxious lest the effects of his ministerial elo- 
 quence should be weakened by his prominent 
 and avowed association with the hunting-field. 
 " As you live" would the bishop say, " so will 
 men believe ; and if the shepherd go astray, 
 well may the flock." 
 
 But Russell, unable to see, if he endeavoured 
 conscientiously to fulfil his duty, that he was 
 either going himself or leading his flock astray 
 
232 MEMOIR OF 
 
 by indulging in his favourite recreation, with- 
 stood the bishop's monitions with a firm but 
 respectful attitude. After a time, however, his 
 lordship, a man of inflexible purpose, on re- 
 ceiving a serious charge against him, and 
 believing it to be well founded, pounced upon 
 Russell with the swoop of an eagle, and sum- 
 moned him and his accuser forthwith to the 
 palace at Exeter. 
 
 The charge was this, that he (Russell) had 
 refused to bury a child on the day named by 
 its parents, because it was his hunting day. 
 
 Both parties being assembled before hinv- 
 with Mr. Secretary Barnes seated at a side- 
 table taking notes on the bishop's behalf, his 
 lordship recited the charge, and said gravely, 
 " Is that true, Mr. Russell ? " 
 
 " Will your lordship permit me to ring the 
 bell ? " 
 
 " Certainly," replied the bishop. 
 
 The bell was then rung, and a servant 
 making his appearance, Russell said, " Be so 
 good as to send in that woman who is now 
 waiting in the hall." 
 
 As she entered the room, Russell turned to 
 the bishop and said, " That is the mother of the 
 
THE RE V. JOHN RUSSELL. 233 
 
 child, my lord. I requested her to accompany 
 the clerk of the parish (Wm. Chappie) to the 
 palace to-day, paid her fare, and here she is. 
 But, otherwise, I have not said one word to 
 her on the subject of the present inquiry. Your 
 lordship can put any question you please to her." 
 
 The bishop then asked her if the charge 
 were true. 
 
 " Nit a word o't, my lord," she answered, 
 unhesitatingly. 
 
 He then requested her to state what had 
 taken place on the occasion, and given rise to 
 such a report. 
 
 She replied that her husband had asked Mr. 
 Russell to bury the child on a Wednesday or 
 Thursday, on whichever day was most con- 
 venient to him ; that he chose the latter, and 
 buried the child on that day. 
 
 " And pray," said the bishop, " were you at 
 all inconvenienced by keeping the body a day 
 longer ? " 
 
 " Not a bit o't, my lord ; us might have kep' 
 un till these day 'twas but a poor atomy thing;" 
 meaning it was quite a skeleton. 
 
 The bishop, finding in this charge r\.Q primd 
 facie case made out against Russell, proceeded 
 
234 MEMOIR OF 
 
 at once to investigate other charges brought 
 by the same accuser ; who, as it turned out, 
 had been grossly misinformed on each and all ; 
 and as they too shared the like fate, falling to 
 the ground without a tittle of evidence to sup- 
 port them, but, on the contrary, with much 
 to disprove them, his lordship turned sharply 
 on him and said : "I am quite shocked 
 to think, sir, that you should have brought so 
 many charges against Mr. Russell, and been 
 unable to substantiate even one of them." 
 
 Much disappointed apparently at the result 
 of the inquiry, and still unwilling to relax his 
 grasp upon Russell, the bishop thus addressed 
 him 
 
 " But the fact still remains, I grieve to say, 
 that you, the incumbent of Swymbridge, keep 
 hounds, and that your curate " (who was also 
 present) " hunts with you. Will you give up 
 your hounds ? " 
 
 " No, my lord ; I decline doing so." 
 
 He then turned to the curate and said, 
 " Your license, sir, I revoke ; and I only regret 
 that the law does not enable me to deal with the 
 graver offender in a far more summary way." 
 
 " I am very happy to find you can't, my 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 235 
 
 lord," said Russell, " and still happier to know 
 that I have done nothing in contravention of 
 the law ; and that it protects me. May I ask 
 then, my lord, if you revoke Mr. Sleeman's 
 license, who is to take the duty at Landkey next 
 Sunday ? " 
 
 " Mr. Sleeman may do it." 
 
 " And who the following Sunday?" inquired 
 Russell. 
 
 " Mr. Sleeman again," responded the bishop, 
 "if by that time you have not secured another 
 curate." 
 
 " I shall take no steps to do so, my lord ; 
 and, moreover, shall be very cautious as to 
 whom I admit into my church," replied Russell, 
 significantly. 
 
 It may be added that, immediately on hear- 
 ing the result of that conference, the parishion- 
 ers of Landkey sent up their churchwarden 
 with a " Round Robin " in Sleeman's favour ; 
 and from that day he remained the curate of 
 Landkey, till he married and removed to 
 Whitchurch, a family living near Tavistock, to 
 which he succeeded on the death of his father. 
 
 " But, my lord," continued Russell, " there 
 are many other clergymen in your diocese who 
 
236 MEMOIR OF 
 
 keep hounds" here a groan from the bishop 
 " why am I singled out among so many ? " 
 
 " Name them," said the bishop impatiently. 
 
 "That I decline doing," replied Russell, 
 firmly. Whereupon the whole party, to their 
 great relief, were dismissed from the episcopal 
 presence. 
 
 Mr. Ralph Barnes, however, overtaking 
 Russell at the palace gate, stopped him by say- 
 ing, "You told the bishop there were other 
 clergymen in the diocese who keep hounds ; 
 you are bound to name them, sir." 
 
 "Well," said Russell, "as I believe that one 
 of them, at least, would not object to my doing 
 so, I give you the name of the Rev. John 
 Froude, of Knowstone." 
 
 That gentleman, as the reader is aware, had 
 already given the bishop more than one back- 
 fall, which neither he nor his secretary would be 
 likely to forget ; he had proved himself, in fact, 
 more than a match for both ; and his lordship 
 was far too clever a strategist to renew an attack 
 which, if unsuccessful, his good sense told him 
 would only weaken his episcopal authority. 
 
 It is no figure of speech to say that, at that 
 period, there were probably a score of clergy- 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 
 
 men who had packs of their own in the diocese 
 of Exeter ; three of whom kept foxhounds only, 
 while the others hunted nominally the hare. 
 
 So the bishop, in commencing, as he very 
 soon did, an energetic crusade against them, 
 had a host to deal with ; every one of whom, 
 not being a curate, would be likely to cry "no 
 surrender " nay, to defend their right of 
 recreation in that fashion to the last shot in 
 their locker. 
 
 There is a story of one the vicar of St. 
 B. an old friend of Russell's on whom soft 
 words and angry monitions were expended 
 alike in vain ; both being equally powerless to 
 bring him either to the bishop's palace or his 
 visitation courts. At length, his patience being 
 exhausted, his lordship issued a formal citation 
 commanding him, at his peril, to attend his next 
 triennial visitation at T , on a given day. 
 
 This step on the part of the bishop, it should 
 be premised, took place at the time when he 
 was engaged in the great Gorham trial ; a case 
 which the Judicial Committee of the Privy 
 Council decided against him by an overwhelm- 
 ing majority ; Knight Bruce being the only 
 legal member of the committee who did not 
 
238 MEMOIR OF 
 
 agree with that decision. So marked a judg- 
 ment in favour of Mr. Gorham, who had 
 been the object of a long and harassing law- 
 suit without, as was then believed, due and 
 reasonable cause, gave rise, of course, to 
 strong comments on the part of the Liberal 
 press ; which, adding fuel to the fire, brought 
 down a certain amount of obloquy on the 
 bishop's name. 
 
 Just at the time when the result of this trial 
 was in every man's mouth, the visitation at 
 
 T took place. On the appointed day, the 
 
 bishop having delivered his charge, the appari- 
 tor then proceeded to summon the clergy sever- 
 ally by name ; and as each came forward to 
 answer the roll-call, a pause and dead silence 
 ensued when the name of the vicar of St. B. 
 was twice called without any response. 
 
 " Is the churchwarden of St. B. present ? J) 
 inquired the bishop in a solemn voice. 
 
 On which a fine old-fashioned yeoman, of 
 portly figure and ruddy countenance, stalked up 
 in his top-boots, and stroking his head deferen- 
 tially announced himself as the churchwarden of 
 St. B. 
 
 " I am very sorry to hear," said the bishop, 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 239 
 
 addressing him, " the sad things that reach me 
 respecting your vicar " 
 
 " My lord," said the yeoman, interrupting 
 him, " don't believe a word of them. I hear 
 strange tales about your lordship, but I don't 
 believe a word of them, not I." 
 
 Another story is told of the bishop and a 
 clergyman in his diocese, who, if not Russell 
 himself, must have been some one very like him : 
 " I am told, my lord," said the latter, " that you 
 object to my hunting." 
 
 " Dear me," said his lordship, with a per- 
 fectly courteous smile, ' ' who could have told 
 you so ? What I object to is, that you should 
 ever do anything else." 
 
 Sarcasm could scarcely go farther. 
 
 I will now give a few extracts from the 
 letters of an old friend, Mr. Trelawny, of Cold- 
 renick, who writes thus respecting Russell and 
 his hounds : 
 
 " The rising generation the gormandising, 
 battue-shooter, and similar people should learn 
 something of the heroes of old, who, alas ! are 
 dying out and leaving few behind them to fill up 
 the gaps. Where now are your Osbaldestones, 
 Kintores, Rosses, and such-like men ? 
 
240 MEMOIR OF 
 
 " Even in fox-hunting, the number slain is 
 everything ; and owing to the number of foxes 
 bred, how seldom do we see a run of ten miles 
 from point to point, much less the fifteen or 
 twenty of olden times ; I have long thought the 
 number spoils the sport. 
 
 "When, let me ask, will Lord- -see such 
 a fortnight as was once seen at Chumleigh ; 
 when with Carew's and Russell's hounds, in 
 twelve consecutive hunting-days, the shortest 
 runs were twelve miles from point to point, as 
 the crow flies ? 
 
 " But, in those days, five and twenty brace 
 killed by a four-day-a-week pack was voted 
 enough. Now, forsooth, if * my lord ' cannot 
 count sixty brace of noses on his kennel door, 
 he is miserable." 
 
 Then, the nightly meetings after the day's 
 sport was over, Mr. Trelawny describes with a 
 few happy and graphic touches : 
 
 "It would not be easy, nowadays, to muster 
 at a fox-hunting dinner such men as the two 
 Russells, father and son ; Sir John Rogers 
 (uncle to the present Lord Blachford), George 
 Leach, George Templer, and the late John 
 Bulteel. The pointed and playful sallies of wit, 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 241 
 
 with which the two latter enlivened the meetings, 
 combined with the racy anecdotes and classical 
 combats of Mr. Russell, sen., and Sir John 
 Rogers, who kept the ball going with unceasing 
 gaiety, was indeed a, treat never to be for- 
 gotten. 
 
 " I remember that once, at Chumleigh, we 
 had no less than six M.F.H.'s present at one 
 dinner-party, viz., Newton Fellowes, who sat 
 next to me, John Bulteel, John King, Templer, 
 Sir Walter Carew, and Jack Russell. The first 
 stuck to his port like a man, flooring his two 
 bottles in true orthodox style ; while the others 
 drank punch Henley Rogers (the Admiral) and 
 Sir John mixing the ' materials ; ' Sir John of 
 gin, most patronized, and the Admiral of rum." 
 
 Again, Mr. Trelawny adds : " Whenever I 
 have sat at the same dinner-table with Jack 
 Russell he has been the life of the party." 
 
 The sale of horses by auction, which took 
 place after dinner, while the symposium was at 
 its height, was often considerable, and added no 
 little to the amusement and sociality of the 
 Chumleigh meetings. It was competent for 
 any one to put up his friend's horse without even 
 consulting him ; the rule being that the owner 
 
 16 
 
242 MEMOIR OF 
 
 should be allowed one bid only to protect him 
 self. Consequently, many a man, bidding care- 
 lessly, too often found himself in the possession 
 of a steed or steeds he had not the remotest 
 intention of buying ; the owner declining to 
 interfere by a bid of his own with the last 
 bidder. 
 
 A shilling being dropped into a wine-glass 
 and the horse named, the bidding was then 
 started by the auctioneer to the club an office 
 ably, and often wittily, fulfilled by Mr. John 
 Dicker Fortescue, at Chumleigh, and, at a later 
 date, by Mr. John King, of Fowelscombe, at 
 the South Molton meetings. 
 
 But Russell, never a good sitter round the 
 wassail-bowl, very rarely took part either as a 
 buyer or seller in these auctions ; for, at the 
 hour of their commencement, generally a late 
 one, he would, as a rule, steal away to rest, 
 enforcing, as he did so, his old maxim on those 
 who pressed him to stay : " Hunting, I tell you, 
 is worth any sacrifice ; and if you sit up and get 
 a headache, you can't thoroughly enjoy it. So, 
 by your leave, good-night, gentlemen." 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 243 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 His Power in Distinguishing Hounds after once Hearing their 
 Names Parts with his Pack Starts again Kennel Manage- 
 ment Firing, etc. Four Days' Work Mr. Houlditch as 
 Whip Kindness to a Curate A Scene between them at 
 Lanacre Bridge on the Moor. 
 
 " Here's a health to ail hunters of every degree, 
 
 Whether clippers, or craners, or hill-top abiders ; 
 The man that hates hunting, he won't do for me, 
 And ought to be pumped on by gentlemen riders." 
 
 OLD SONG. 
 
 THE old saying that the "dog will have his 
 day," is a proverb by no means inapplicable to 
 the Chumleigh Club ; for, after flourishing with 
 much vigour and success for more than twenty 
 years, symptoms of decay set in, and at length 
 became too apparent, when Mr. Templer, Sir 
 John Rogers, Mr. Bulteel, and other promi- 
 nent members ceased, one by one, to attend its 
 meetings. 
 
 The dog had had his day ; but still, fox- 
 hunting in the North of Devon not only suffered 
 
244 MEMOIR OF 
 
 no check on the ultimate dissolution of that 
 club, but, on the contrary, exhibited year after 
 year a strong and increasing vitality, striking 
 deep roots into the genial soil, and thriving 
 steadily and vigorously under the fostering care 
 of John Russell and Newton Fellowes. 
 
 The latter gentleman, indeed, besides main- 
 taining a noble pack of hounds on a grand 
 scale, and doing all in his power to promote the 
 cause of fox-hunting, not less by territorial 
 influence than by his own kind-heartedness and 
 hospitality, did more to improve the breed of 
 horses than any man in the West of England ; 
 Czar Peter, Escape, Colossus, Anacreon, and 
 Mufti forming a part of his stud, the last 
 being an invaluable hunter, bred by the Duke 
 of Bedford. 
 
 Partial, however, as Mr. Fellowes was to 
 thoroughbred stock, it was a favourite theory of 
 his that to breed a useful Devonshire hunter a 
 weight-carrier with powerful quarters and airy 
 forehand the produce of a thoroughbred mare 
 by a strong but light-actioned pack-horse was a 
 far better cross than the one so commonly 
 adopted by the farmers of that country, namely, 
 a cross from a pack-dam by a thoroughbred sire. 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 245 
 
 But on this point his own practice, it must be 
 remembered, was little in accordance with the 
 above theory ; as, indeed, might be expected 
 from so great a lover of blood-stock as the 
 Squire of Eggesford. 
 
 So much for Russell's neighbour ; now for 
 himself. The big, raking hounds in which Mr. 
 Fellowes so delighted, and which swept the 
 moor with so grand a head, were in Russell's 
 estimation too big for the high banks and close 
 covers of that country. Still, their power of 
 driving on a half-scent, their indomitable per- 
 severance, and, above all, their tambourine, 
 sonorous tongues, which made the deep combes 
 of Devon ring again with applause, fairly 
 charmed Russell's heart. He could thus tell to 
 a yard how they were turning in cover ; and 
 barring their unwieldy size, so far as his means 
 would permit, he did all he could to fashion his 
 own pack after that model. But, of course, it 
 was an unequal game between the pocket of 
 the feudal lord on one side, and that of the 
 perpetual curate of Swymbridge on the other ! 
 And although the latter contrived, by hook or 
 by crook, to get together after a time quite as 
 killing a pack of hounds as any in England, 
 
246 MEMOIR OF 
 
 they were the gleanings only of many kennels, 
 and consequently, in point of uniformity and 
 grand appearance, were as unlike those of his 
 neighbour as a Satyr might be to Hyperion. 
 
 Still, "handsome is that handsome does ;" 
 and year after year the sport Russell continued to 
 show equalled, at least, if it did not surpass, that 
 of any pack in the country. With him, in those 
 days, so long as a hound was a good worker, it 
 mattered little what his looks were. " Let me 
 go into a strange kennel," he would say, "give 
 me the pick of the pack and I'll take first and 
 foremost the plain-looking ones ; there is sure 
 to be good stuff in them, or they wouldn't be 
 there. The same may be said with regard to 
 the fair sex ; when you see a plain woman 
 married, depend upon it, she has been chosen 
 for qualities which amply compensate for the 
 absence of mere beauty. Nature, you know, is 
 just, and ever loves a fair balance." 
 
 To ordinary observers, unaccustomed to 
 hounds, one hound is so like another that, unless 
 the colour were distinct, they would, in ten 
 minutes after their names were given, be unable 
 to say, "This is Dulcimer and that Dardan." 
 Nay, the great majority of men, who go on 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 247 
 
 hunting for season after season with the same 
 pack, would be hopelessly at fault if called on to 
 point out a single hound by his right name, 
 often as he may have led the pack and they 
 heard his name. The features of a flock of 
 sheep Southdown, for instance are all alike 
 to men who are no shepherds ; nevertheless, to 
 those whose care they are, the visage of each 
 sheep is as well known as that of every hound 
 in his pack to a kennel-huntsman. 
 
 Russell, however, had a marvellous power, 
 amounting almost to an instinct, in this respect ; 
 the gift of nature it w r as, beyond a doubt, culti- 
 vated by long and familiar association with 
 hounds a gift which enabled him, after he had 
 once seen a pack leisurely drawn from one 
 court into another, to distinguish them, and for 
 the most part call them by their right names 
 when he met them in the field on the follow- 
 ing day. 
 
 Will Long, huntsman to the Badminton 
 hounds under three Dukes of Beaufort, was so 
 impressed by this faculty of Russell's, that it 
 quite astonished him. " I have been mixed up 
 with hounds all my life," said the veteran, " but 
 I never met any man like Mr. Russell. Why, 
 
248 MEMOIR OF 
 
 he was a couple of hours on our flags one day, 
 and the next, when we were out hunting, he 
 didn't want me to tell him the name of this 
 hound or that ; he knew them almost as well 
 as I did." 
 
 A curate of Russell's, in the absence of the 
 higher authority, was once consulted by a gentle- 
 man, who had been recommended by his phy- 
 sician to keep a pack of harriers. 
 
 " But," said he, "as I shall never remember 
 their names, nor know one hound from another, 
 if I get a whole pack at once, I have determined 
 to buy a couple at a time, and make their 
 acquaintance before I take in any more." 
 
 And this method of learning their names he 
 absolutely adopted. 
 
 During his long residence at Tordown, 
 Russell more than once parted with the greater 
 part of his pack, retaining only a few couples as 
 a nucleus for a fresh and stronger lot. On one 
 occasion some twenty couples had been drafted 
 for foreign service, and it is a fact that the gen- 
 tleman who became their master, and hunted 
 them himself for the whole season, knew the 
 name of but one of them a hound called 
 " Primrose " at the end of it, her colour being 
 
THE RE V. JOHN R US SELL. 249 
 
 different from that of the other hounds. Neither 
 did he trouble his head to inquire the history of 
 a single hound. 
 
 " Tyrell told me," wrote Mr. Russell to an 
 old friend, " that he gave him (the aforesaid 
 gentleman) a setter and a pointer in the month 
 of August, and that he could not, in the follow- 
 ing Christmas week, tell him the names of 
 either, nor which was the pointer and which 
 the setter, though he had shot over them for 
 four months." 
 
 Again, among the lot he took was a hound 
 called " Abelard," to whose classical name in 
 connection with the ill-fated " Eloise " that 
 most exquisite poem his reading had never 
 soared. Never, too, having noticed the name 
 in any list of hounds, he was sorely perplexed, 
 and came to the conclusion that some mistake 
 must have occurred, and that the hound's real 
 name was " Happy- Lord." " Tis a merry little 
 hound, you % know, and that's why, I suppose, 
 Russell gave him that queer name," he said, as 
 he drew the hound with the point of his whip, 
 and distinctly cajled him " Happy-Lord." 
 
 There is a story told of a fine old-fashioned 
 Devonshire squire, a friend of Russell's, long 
 
250 MEMOIR OF 
 
 since passed away, that having a fancy for 
 hounds' names terminating with "maid," he 
 gave orders to his huntsman to call the 
 first three bitches that came up from walk 
 as follows : " Barmaid," " Dairymaid," and 
 " Ganymaid." 
 
 Nor is that a solitary instance of the con- 
 fusion created by the sex of Jove's cupbearer ; 
 for Russell relates that Dr. Troyte, of Hunts- 
 ham, having received a dog-hound, so called, 
 from Mr. Newton Fellowes, old Will Dinni- 
 combe, his huntsman, refused point-blank to 
 call the hound by that name ; declaring to his 
 master that " nobody, as he knowed, but Squire 
 Fellowes wi'd a ca'd a dog-hound Ganymaid ; 
 and ef yeu plaise, maister, us'll call un Gany- 
 boy ; 'tis more fitty like." Will had his way, 
 and from that day the hound went by the latter 
 name. 
 
 Hounds, as we all know, are governed by 
 their likes and dislikes, their fancies and preju- 
 dices, very much in the fashion of human 
 beings ; but with this difference the honest 
 brutes do not disguise their feelings, as the 
 animals gifted with reason are too apt to do. 
 Sir John Eardley-Wilmot, in his very interesting 
 
THE RE V. JOHN R USSEL L. 251 
 
 " Reminiscences of the late Mr. Assheton 
 Smith," represents that eminent sportsman as 
 having possessed a " fascination " over hounds ; 
 while they, on their part, always evinced the 
 strongest attachment towards him. 
 
 " I recollect," relates one of his friends, "his 
 once having out five couples of drafts whom he 
 had never seen before. Sharp, his kennel- 
 huntsman at that time, gave him the names 
 written down ; he then called each hound 
 separately, and gave him a piece of bread, and 
 then returned the list to the huntsman, saying, 
 ' I know them now ;' and so they did him. On 
 other occasions, when the fixture was ' Oare 
 Hill,' and the hounds were awaiting his arrival, 
 Dick Burton used to say, * Master is coming, I 
 perceive, by the hounds ;' and this long before 
 he made his appearance. When he came 
 within three hundred yards, no huntsman or 
 whip in the world could have stopped the pack 
 from bounding to meet him. In the morning, 
 when let loose from the kennel, they would 
 rush to his study window, or to the hall door, 
 and stand there till he came out." 
 
 Mr. Musters, too, that paragon of gentlemen 
 huntsmen, although he seldom visited his ken- 
 
252 MEMOIR OF 
 
 nel, and saw little of his pack except in the 
 hunting-field, was the very idol of his hounds ; 
 nor, associated as he was with the sport they 
 enjoyed, was such an attachment to be won- 
 dered at, for he led them in the chase, and 
 where their instinct failed, his judgment stepped 
 in and cheered them to victory. 
 
 And, for that very reason, no man in the 
 world was ever more loved by hounds than 
 Russell himself. " It isn't the man," as he 
 rightly maintained, "who feeds the hounds 
 whom they most like ; but the man who opens 
 their prison door, lets them out of kennel, and 
 says, ' There, go forth and enjoy your liberty;' 
 and then helps them in their work." 
 
 On one occasion, owing to the inveterate 
 opposition he met with from a great landed pro- 
 prietor, whose tenants and keepers were ordered 
 to kill foxes over the whole extent of his wide 
 domain a difference in politics being the chief 
 gravamen Russell once more came to the 
 conclusion that, for the sake of peace, he would 
 give up his hounds, and again he parted with a 
 large draft. 
 
 Soon after this event he met Sir John 
 Duntze, who, hearing what had taken place, 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 253 
 
 seemed loth to believe the unwelcome news. 
 " You can't live without hounds, Russell I 
 know you can't," said the incredulous baronet. 
 " Now, I'll make you an offer ; I'll give you 
 five pounds, if you'll give me one, for every 
 year that you don't keep hounds." 
 
 And Sir John was right ; for the following 
 season saw Russell reinforced with a strong 
 draft from the Hambledon, which, with old 
 Milliner and a few hounds of the Mercury 
 blood set him going again with renewed vigour. 
 That Milliner was a hound after Russell's own 
 heart. A light whimper from her for she'd 
 occasionally speak on a drag had a world of 
 meaning in it for his ears. 
 
 " We shall find in this cover," he would say; 
 " that's a tongue that never told a lie." 
 
 Then came the double-tongue, and the fox 
 was on his legs that instant. 
 
 His best friend at this time, both as a fox- 
 preserver and a liberal supporter of his hounds, 
 was Sir Arthur Chichester, of Youlston, who, 
 although still with his regiment, the 7th Dra- 
 goons, not only gave Russell the benefit of his 
 territorial influence, but aided him handsomely 
 with the sinews of war. Sir Arthur, in early 
 
254 MEMOIR OF 
 
 youth, had been well entered by his father, who 
 kept hounds at Youlston, and who, when Mr. 
 Templer's packs were broken up, was lucky 
 enough to secure a fair share of the " Let-'em- 
 alones " for his own kennel the best of 
 which, however, fell soon afterwards into 
 Russell's hands. 
 
 The present baronet had succeeded to his 
 title and retired from the army for some time, 
 when Russell, paying him a visit on a beautiful 
 summer's morning, found him in the park 
 busily engaged in riding down the deer, which 
 he had made up his mind to get rid of and kill, 
 one by one, as they were wanted for his own 
 and his friend's use. His mode of operation 
 being somewhat unique and original, Russell's 
 interest was much attracted by the exciting 
 scene. By the help of a second, and even a 
 third horse, Sir Arthur was able to ride down 
 the stoutest buck ; and then with a lance, after 
 the manner of pursuing the boar in India, he 
 contrived to spear it with marvellous adroitness 
 and precision. 
 
 " I'll give you that fawn, Russell, if you can 
 catch it," said the baronet, pointing out a lively 
 little fellow, galloping beside its dam. 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 255 
 
 In a moment Russell's horse was in full 
 swing ; and in less than ten minutes he had 
 captured his panting little prize, alive and 
 unhurt. He carried it to Tordown in his arms; 
 and happening to have a hound-bitch, called 
 Cloudy, whose puppies had been destroyed on 
 that very day, he put the fawn to her, and after 
 a brief but cautious introduction, had the satis- 
 faction of seeing the pair nestling together on 
 the most intimate terms. This fawn, brought 
 up among the hounds, and subject like them 
 to kennel discipline, waxed after a time into a 
 fine, healthy, and bold animal ; so bold, that it 
 would knock the hounds off the benches without 
 ceremony, in order to get at and cuddle by the 
 side of its foster-mother. But, alas ! like most 
 pets, it came to an untimely end ; the hounds 
 had been taken out of kennel, and the poor 
 fawn, in rushing after Cloudy and attempting to 
 jump through a gate, dashed its brains out 
 against the bars and died on the spot. Will 
 Rawle Russell's henchman, kennel-man, and 
 faithful servant for forty years was inconsolable, 
 declaring he would rather have lost his Christ- 
 mas pig than that fawn. 
 
 Perhaps at no period of Russell's life was 
 
256 MEMOIR OF 
 
 his pack stronger, or more efficient, than about 
 the year 1 840 ; but as, with the exception of a 
 few hounds bred by himself from the old Stover 
 strain, it consisted mainly of drafts from other 
 kennels, the lot as a whole were, of course, 
 unlevel and ill-matched, and on that account 
 would scarcely have passed muster at a flag- 
 scrutiny even in those days ; still, if taken 
 individually, every hound had a character of his 
 own, and bore the tower-stamp impressed on 
 his face, and, we may be very sure, was fairly 
 entitled to his daily meal. Deeds, and not 
 looks, were the prime consideration ; for, as in 
 the celebrated Tom Hodgson's case, " no 
 Modishes and Merkins were kept, because 
 they were too handsome to hang, and too 
 bad to give away ; but almost every hound 
 looked like his master, as if he knew how to 
 kill a fox." 
 
 It is almost needless to add that, notwith- 
 standing the care of the kennel-man already 
 referred to, the condition of his hounds was 
 closely and constantly supervised by Russell 
 himself ; nor is it too much to say that, the con- 
 stitution of each individual hound being so well 
 known to him, he could tell to a scruple the pro- 
 
THE RE V. JOHN R US SELL. 2 5 7 
 
 portion of broth, or flesh, which should be given 
 to one and not to another. That, in fact, was 
 the great secret of their killing and enduring 
 powers ; they were always up to the mark, 
 and consequently far superior in condition to 
 the wild animal they were called upon to 
 hunt. 
 
 " I was in the kennel with him on one occa- 
 sion," records an old curate, "when, pointing to 
 a hound with a long face and a high crown, 
 callecj Gainer, he said, ' That hound has been 
 injured in the stifle, but he's so good on the 
 line that I can't afford to draft him ; fire is 
 the only remedy, and the sooner it's done the 
 better.' 
 
 " So, suiting the action to the word, he 
 ordered Will Raw r le to couple up the hound 
 and lead him to a post in the courtyard. On 
 that post, about four feet from the ground, was 
 a strong iron ring, through which the chain- 
 couple was passed, and the hound hauled up 
 till he stood almost erect on his hind legs, with 
 his head close to the post, around which the 
 couple was then secured. The iron being 
 quickly heated, Russell caught the hound by 
 the hind foot, straightened the leg, and per- 
 
 17 
 
258 MEMOIR OF 
 
 formed the operation with the most artistic skill 
 in something less than one minute. The 
 scoring was perfect, and he went through the 
 whole of it without a particle of help from Will 
 or myself. 
 
 " A day or two afterwards," continues the 
 same informant, " we were jogging together to 
 a meet at Yard Down Gate, the pack following 
 leisurely along, some almost under the stirrup, 
 and a few at the tail of Russell's horse. He 
 was chatting merrily, as usual, but, at the 
 same time, his eye never ceased travelling from 
 one hound to another, as if he were studying 
 the condition and fitness of every hound in the 
 pack for the day's work before them. Sud- 
 denly he stopped his horse, dismounted, and 
 handing the rein to me, said, ' Lavender's not 
 quite right ; hold my horse an instant while I 
 look her over.' 
 
 "He then examined her eyes, and before I 
 could understand what he was about to do, 
 pulled a lancet from his pocket and bled her on 
 the spot, A man we met soon afterwards was 
 then sent back with her to Tordown. 
 
 " Again, the meet being on this occasion at 
 the Mervin's Arms, Russell, on looking over 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 259 
 
 a young black-and-white hound called Waver- 
 ley, recently sent to him from a distance, dis- 
 covered him to be unbranded. 
 
 " ' This won't do,' he said ; ' we shall pro- 
 bably run to-day from Whityfield to the deep 
 covers of Henstridge, above Berry- N arbor, and 
 if we lose that hound we shall never see him 
 again.' He then jumped off his horse, took the 
 hound between his knees, and drawing a small 
 scissors from his pocket-book, he instantly 
 and most cleverly cut out a great R in the 
 hair of Waverley's ribs. ' There,' he said, 
 ' no matter where he turns up now, he'll 
 be sent back to my kennel for fifty miles 
 round. 5 
 
 " True enough, we found in Whityfield, 
 Leveller, Gameboy, and Falstaff breaking 
 almost on his back, as the fox, a white-tagged 
 old Hector, put his head straight for Hen- 
 stridge, where, after a sharp burst, he saved his 
 brush by going to ground. Found No. 2 at 
 Arlington ; ran to Youlston, Cocksley, Pigslake 
 Wood, crossed the river, and killed him by 
 moonlight in a cottage above Goodleigh. The 
 whole village, with the parson at their head 
 one of that good old sort yclept Harding, of 
 
260 MEMOIR OF 
 
 Upcot turning out to greet Russell and wel- 
 come his field." 
 
 But Russell, too, as well as his hounds, must 
 have been in fine form at that time, or the 
 hardihood even of his frame could never have 
 stood the strain imposed on it by the four 
 following days' work, which, by an old letter of 
 his, is thus recorded : " I left this house (Tor- 
 down) on one eventful morning, rode to Iddes- 
 leigh (twenty miles), whither I had sent the 
 hounds the evening before, found a fox and 
 killed him during one of the most awful storms 
 of thunder, lightning, and rain I ever saw. 
 Scent breast high from first to last. I then 
 rode to Ash, Mr. Mallet's place, dined there, 
 and danced afterwards till one o'clock ; went to 
 bed and rose again at three ; pulled on my top- 
 boots and rode down to Bodmin, just fifty 
 miles, and met Tom Hext's hounds about five 
 miles from that town. Found a good fox and 
 killed him ; dined with my old friend Pomeroy 
 Gilbert, and again did not get to bed much 
 against my rule till the little hours. Rested 
 the next day, if walking several miles to a 
 country fair could be called resting ; then off 
 next morning at three ; rode back to Iddes- 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 261 
 
 leigh, took out the hounds, found a fox in Dow- 
 land, and killed him close to the Schoolmaster 
 Inn in Chawleigh parish, twelve miles as the 
 crow flies. I then turned my horse's head for 
 Tordown, and was sitting down to dinner at 
 my own table, and all the hounds home, at 
 six o'clock, the distance being fully twenty 
 miles from the said Schoolmaster Inn to this 
 house." 
 
 Owing to a succession of bad harvests 
 throughout the land, Irish oatmeal, the staple 
 food of hounds, had risen about this time to a 
 price unheard of since the war with France ; and 
 it was with no little alarm that many an M.F.H. 
 found himself compelled to give 16, or even 
 i& per ton, for what he could have purchased 
 aforetime at the lower sum of 12. Not a few, 
 accordingly, with an eye to economy, turned 
 their attention to Indian meal, hoping to find in 
 it, though a cheaper article, still a satisfactory 
 substitute for the more expensive food. But 
 experience soon proved that, much as it was at 
 first vaunted, it lacked that rare muscle-giving 
 aliment, that stand-by quality, so bountifully 
 possessed by sound oatmeal. 
 
 Russell never would try it during the 
 
262 MEMOIR OF 
 
 season ; but, knowing that a friend of his had 
 done so, and hearing that his hounds rarely 
 ended with a kill, he exclaimed, " No wonder ; 
 it's that Indian meal that does it. The hounds 
 are as good as they ever were ; but fed on that 
 wishy-washy ' trade/ I'll defy them, or any 
 hounds on earth, to kill a good fox." 
 
 Russell's independence in the field with 
 respect to the services of a regular whip having 
 been already alluded to, it may be mentioned 
 that enthusiastic, amateur aspirants would now 
 and again volunteer to act in that capacity, 
 and take upon themselves the full duties of a 
 hired servant. One especially, Mr, Houlditch, 
 a Somersetshire gentleman, hearing almost 
 fabulous tales of the sport shown by the 
 N.D.H., migrated from his own into Russell's 
 country, and at once offered his services, pro- 
 posing to act as field-adjutant, and undertake, 
 as far as his ability would permit, the ordinary 
 work of a regular whip. 
 
 The offer at the time happened to be most 
 opportune, and was gratefully accepted on 
 Russell's part ; but, alas ! on the very first day 
 that Mr. Houlditch appeared in his official 
 capacity, Russell discovered, by the most un- 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 263 
 
 mistakable signs, that his knowledge of the 
 " noble science " was simply that of the veriest 
 tyro, and that in reality he knew just as much 
 as Billy Button, or a Tooley Street tailor, might 
 be supposed to know about such matters. 
 Still Mr. Houlditch, in spite of all difficulties, 
 persevered, paying the closest attention to the 
 lessons nay, it may be said, the lectures 
 which his chief so frequently bestowed on him, 
 not in the field, but on returning from their 
 day's work. Many a time was it said to 
 Russell, " Do what you will, you'll never make 
 a sportsman of Houlditch ; he hasn't it in him, 
 and is too old to learn." 
 
 But so long as the pupil was anxious to 
 improve, so long did his master do his utmost 
 to instruct and encourage him in the sylvan 
 duties he had undertaken to perform, till at 
 length, after a season or two of continuous 
 drill, the perseverance of both was crowned 
 witk complete success ; and it must have been 
 as gratifying for Russell to say as for the other 
 to hear, that " Houlditch understood his work 
 as well as most men, and had become a most 
 useful and obliging whip." He served in that 
 capacity for six consecutive years, and when he 
 
264 MEMOIR OF 
 
 left, created a blank which Russell was never 
 able in like fashion to fill again. 
 
 Much has been said of the active service 
 which Russell expected from his curates in the 
 hunting-field, when parochial duties did not 
 absolutely require their attendance at home ; 
 but, of course, some of the stories told in that 
 respect were utterly untrue. One, for instance, 
 describes him as testing the voices of two rival 
 applicants aspiring to become his curate, by 
 making them give " view-holloas," and then 
 accepting the one whose voice sounded the 
 most penetrating and most sonorous a capital 
 story, no doubt, for those who cultivate charity 
 by believing and circulating such tales ; but, as 
 a matter of fact, it is one which rests on as 
 baseless a fabric as the fleecy clouds that float 
 through the sky. 
 
 That he never objected to the company and 
 help of his curate in the hunting-field is quite 
 true, provided always that the parochial duty, 
 for which he was responsible, was first attended 
 to and duly fulfilled ; nay, if his curate had a taste 
 for hunting, Russell would even encourage 
 him to enjoy the pastime, maintaining, with 
 Dr. Watts, that Satan would find him some- 
 
THE RE V. JOHN RUSSELL. 265 
 
 thing- worse to do, if he remained idle at 
 home. 
 
 The following anecdote, however, is, beyond 
 all doubt, a true one, and shall be given in the 
 very words of an ear-witness, the late Rev. 
 William Hocker, vicar of Buckerell, who related 
 it to the writer of this memoir soon after the 
 incident occurred. Mr. Hocker was standing 
 at a shop-door in Barnstaple on a market-day, 
 when Will Chappie, the parish clerk of Swym- 
 bridge, entered the shop, and while his business 
 was being attended to, the grocer thus interro- 
 gated him : 
 
 " Well, Mr. Chappie, and have 'ee got a 
 coorate yet for Swymbridge ? " 
 
 " Not yet, sir master's nation partic'ler ; 
 'tisn't this man nor 'tisn't that as'll suit un ; but 
 here's his advertisement " (pulling out a copy 
 of the North Devon Journal], '' so I reckon 
 he'll soon get one now. 
 
 " * Wanted, a curate for Swymbridge ; must 
 be a gentleman of moderate and orthodox 
 
 views.' 
 
 " Orthodox ! Mr. Chappie ; what doth he 
 mean by that ? " inquired the grocer. 
 
 " Well," said the clerk, in some perplexity, 
 
266 MEMOIR OF 
 
 knowing the double nature of the curate's 
 work, secular as well as sacred, " I can't exactly 
 say ; but I reckon 'tis a man as can ride pretty 
 well." 
 
 An old curate of his gives the following 
 grateful but very brief record of the kindness 
 and hospitality he received both from Mr. and 
 Mrs. Russell during his residence at Swym- 
 bridge : " My first reception by Russell I shall 
 never forget. I had ridden a long distance, 
 the latter part of it by devious lanes and count- 
 less cross-roads, which, as they were all strange 
 to me, perplexed and jaded me far more than 
 even the- length of the ride, when at nightfall I 
 reached the modest lodgings taken for me in 
 the village at Swyfnbridge. My landlady, Mrs. 
 Burgess, a most respectable woman, besides 
 two sets of apartments let to myself and an- 
 other gentleman, dear old Walter Radcliffe, 
 kept also in the same house a general shop, 
 where any article of food, from a double 
 Glo'ster to a flitch of bacon, or a penny loaf to 
 a packet of tea, might be had at a moment's 
 notice ; so that for the cravings of nature the 
 wherewithal was at hand to satisfy my utmost 
 wants. I had just quitted a happy home, 
 
THE RE V. JOHN R US SELL . 267 
 
 broken up by my family migrating to Dresden 
 for education ; consequently, notwithstanding 
 the kindly manner of my hostess, and her 
 anxiety to make me comfortable, a sense of 
 loneliness crept over me such as I had not felt 
 for many a year, and I turned away from the 
 savoury broiled rasher set before me as if I 
 had been a Hebrew of the Hebrews, and hated 
 the sight of the unhallowed food. At that 
 moment a man's voice at the door aroused my 
 attention he was inquiring for me and be- 
 fore I could rise from my seat Russell stalked 
 in, grasped my hand without ceremony, and 
 bid me welcome to his parish in so cheery a 
 tone that in an instant my depressed spirits, 
 rising like a mist in the morning, took wing 
 and passed away. 
 
 " ' Holloa,' he said, looking at the table, 
 1 this won't do ; you must come up and dine 
 with us. Come as you are, plain fare and no 
 formality.' 
 
 " I pleaded the necessity of unpacking my 
 portmanteau, and devoting a few minutes to 
 the Graces ; but he wouldn't hear of it. 
 
 " * No,' he said, ' come along ; you're 
 quite smart enough. Mrs. Russell won't 
 
268 MEMOIR OF 
 
 look at your coat, if you'll only eat a good 
 dinner.' 
 
 " The invitation, I felt, was tantamount to 
 a command, and accordingly, without further 
 objection, I rose and obeyed. 
 
 " The dinner, an ample one, was yet sim- 
 plicity itself a cod's head and shoulders, the 
 produce of Barnstaple Bay, a haunch of Ex- 
 moor mutton, hung to an hour ; then an apple 
 pudding, flavoured with lemon peel, and boiled 
 to perfection. ' " Carpe diem" which, freely 
 translated, means " keep cutting," ' said Russell, 
 calling for a hot plate, and inviting me to take 
 another slice of the delicious moor mutton. He 
 then asked how I had reached Swymbridge, 
 and by what route I had come. 
 
 " ' Across country,' I replied ; ' by way of 
 Cobbaton and Umberleigh Bridge.' 
 
 " ' An awkward line for a stranger,' he re- 
 marked, ' But you rode, of course ; and pray 
 what's become of your horse ? ' 
 
 "'Gone to the village inn,' I said, 'where 
 I saw him fed and bedded up for the night. 
 He's my sole stand-by ; does the double work 
 of hack and hunter, so I hope will be well 
 cared for, as I value him greatly.' 
 
THE RE V. JOHN RUSSELL. 269 
 
 " ' Then he musn't stay there another 
 minute, or, in all probability, he'll be kicked by 
 some farmer's horse before the night's over ; ' 
 said Russell, rising to ring the bell, and giving 
 orders that the horse should be fetched and 
 brought to his stable at once. ' To-morrow,' 
 he continued, ' you'll have no difficulty in find- 
 ing a quiet little box in the village, and you 
 must go to Barnstaple next market-day and 
 buy your hay and corn, for at Swymbridge 
 you'll get none.' 
 
 " The next morning, as I was about to sit 
 down to breakfast, to my great surprise a cart, 
 heavily laden with hay and corn, stood at the 
 door of my lodgings, and before I could make 
 any inquiry as to its ownership, the man in 
 charge, seeing me at an open window, thus 
 addressed me : ' If yeu plaise, sir, this here hay 
 and woats be for yeu, wi' maister's compli- 
 ments.' 
 
 " Had I possessed the cap of Fortunatus, I 
 could scarcely have wished for a more welcome 
 gift, as the business of buying good upland hay 
 and old oats in Devonshire, at that season of 
 the year, was, as I knew from experience, a 
 most difficult job. Now, however, through 
 
270 MEMOIR OF 
 
 Russell's kindness and liberality, I had ample 
 time before me to look around and suit myself 
 in that respect. But I will not recount the 
 similar acts of kind consideration in various 
 ways, especially in those of hospitality, which 
 I received from him and Mrs. Russell during 
 that happy and unclouded period of my early 
 life passed at Swymbridge. 
 
 " Once, and once only," continues the same 
 curate, " did a slight skirmish take place be- 
 tween us, and that was on the wild open moor 
 near Lanacre Bridge. It was a cold biting day 
 in February. We had found in Twitchen 
 Town Wood, and the hounds, with a grand 
 scent, having brought their fox up to the bridge, 
 had' there come to a check. A hound called 
 Castor, however, hitting the fox under the 
 archway of the bridge, through which the flood 
 had carried him, dashed into the angry river, 
 and by some means became unable either to 
 pass under the arch or land on the opposite 
 bank. ' The hound will be drowned ; jump in 
 and save him/ shouted Russell to me, in a state 
 of the wildest panic ; jump in, I say.' 
 
 " But, in truth, I saw no danger for the 
 hound ; whereas a plunge into the roaring Barle, 
 
THE RE V. JOHN RUSSELL. 27 1 
 
 forbiddingly keen as the wind blew, was likely 
 to be one for me. I hesitated for an instant, 
 and as I did so Castor struggled out, and, like 
 a brave hound, threw his tongue manfully on 
 the opposite side of the river. Directly after- 
 wards, on my rating a hound for some fault 
 he had committed, Russell turned sharply 
 round, and said, " That's a puppy, let him 
 alone ; don't rate him, or you'll ruin him.' 
 
 " ' Don't speak to me in that way/ I said, 
 fairly roused this time by his peremptory man- 
 ner, 'or I'll never turn a hound for you again.' 
 
 "It remains to be added that we killed our 
 fox soon afterwards ; and no two men could 
 have jogged home together on better terms 
 than Russell and I did after that event. My 
 act of rebellion, however, was not forgotten by 
 him ; for to this day, when the hounds pass 
 near Lanacre Bridge, he is wont to tell the tale 
 with infinite zest and humour, pointing out the 
 very spot to those around him, ' Where Davies 
 mutinied ; threatening, if I dared to rate him, 
 that he'd never turn a hound for me again.' ' 
 
272 MEMOIR OF 
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 
 The South Motion Club Stopping out the Foxes " Beatrice 
 and Barbara" Russell and Raddiffes 'Stories The " Little 
 Specklety Hen" Russell 'j Ducking in the Barle Mallard 
 and Cat snapped up by Foxes in Chase. 
 
 " Glorious West country ! . . . you must not despise their 
 accent, for it is the remains of a purer and nobler dialect tha 
 our own ; and you will be surprised to hear me, when I am 
 merry, burst out into pure unintelligible Devonshire : when I 
 am very childish, my own country's language comes to me like 
 a dream of old days ! . . ."CHARLES KINGSLEY. 
 
 IN 1845-46 a project for starting a new fox- 
 hunting club in the north of Devon, the rules 
 and arrangements of which should be identical 
 with those of the old Chumleigh meetings, being 
 warmly approved by Russell, it was resolved to 
 establish it forthwith at South Molton, that 
 town being a convenient centre for the accom- 
 modation of all parties. Accordingly, by Rus- 
 sell's invitation, the packs of Sir Walter Carew 
 and Mr. Trelawny were appointed, together 
 with his own, to hunt the country for a whole 
 fortnight in spring and autumn ; while the 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 273 
 
 George Inn was fixed upon as head-quarters 
 for the mess and the numerous hunting men 
 who, it was expected, would flock to the little 
 town from all parts of Devon and Cornwall. 
 
 Nor was this expectation a delusive one. 
 Throughout the county, north and south, the 
 new club was looked upon as a kind of phcenix, 
 rising, with renewed vigour in its wings, from 
 the smouldering ashes of the Chumleigh Club ; 
 the triumvirate alone, to whom its revival was 
 due, namely, Mr. Russell, Sir Walter Carew, 
 and Mr. Trelawny, of Coldrenick, being an 
 ample guarantee that success would certainly 
 follow upon such a combination. 
 
 Accordingly, on the occasion of the meet- 
 ings, not only were the country-houses in the 
 neighbourhood thrown open to friends from a 
 distance, but every available bed and stall in 
 South Molton was secured for weeks before- 
 hand by gentlemen who, preferring the freedom 
 of a hostelry to private hospitality, deemed it a 
 matter of loyalty to the club to live at head- 
 quarters and support the mess. 
 
 Foxes, as Russell well knew, were just suffi- 
 ciently plentiful, though not one too many to 
 warrant the strain on his country necessitated 
 
 18 
 
274 MEMOIR OF 
 
 by two exotic packs, which, besides his own, 
 were about to hunt it for twelve days, twice in 
 the year. But, that it was so stocked appeared 
 a marvel to all ; for, occupying in the very heart 
 of it an extensive area, comprising many square 
 miles of cultivated farms, moors, and deep wood- 
 lands, in which game was strictly preserved, 
 dwelt a magnate of the land, and one whose 
 hostility, on political grounds, Russell had been 
 unfortunate enough to provoke. 
 
 Tenants and keepers, accordingly, had re- 
 ceived peremptory orders not only to forbid 
 Russell from drawing the covers, but to wage 
 an exterminating war against foxes, old and 
 young, by trapping and digging them out at all 
 seasons of the year ; still, notwithstanding that 
 edict, Russell found means to keep up a fair 
 stock on every side of that wide domain indeed, 
 now and again, the very tenants themselves 
 hesitated not, on discovering a litter laid up on 
 the grounds, to take measures for securing its 
 safety, either by smoking the earth, or warning 
 some friend to fox-hunting that the sooner the 
 cubs were disturbed the better it would be for 
 their lives. 
 
 About a month before the first meeting of 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 275 
 
 the club at South Molton, in November, 1845, 
 a farmer living near Exford, a parish in Somer- 
 setshire beyond the left bank of the Barle, fore- 
 boding ill to a litter he had long guarded as the 
 apple of his eye, wrote a letter to Russell, 
 beseeching him, in short but pithy terms, to 
 bring his hounds over and scatter the cubs. It 
 ran thus : 
 
 " HONOR'D SIR, 
 
 " Do ee plaise bring up the dogs first 
 chance ; us a got a fine litter, sure enough, up 
 to Hollacomb brake. They'm up full-growed 
 a month agone ; and last night was a week, 
 what must em do but kill Mistiss' old gander & 
 seven more wi' un her's most gone mazed 
 owing to't so do ee plaise come up Sir and gi 
 'em a rattle they'm rale beauties, they be, as 
 ever you clapped your eyes on." 
 
 Russell lost no time in obeying the sum- 
 mons ; he went off alone, slept, and kennelled 
 the hounds for the night at Hawkridge Rectory, 
 the hospitable residence of the Rev. Joseph 
 Jekyll, a gentleman pronounced by Russell to 
 be one of the finest and hardest riders in that 
 or any other country ; a direct descendant, too, 
 
276 MEMOIR OF 
 
 of the eminent anti-Jacobite judge, and nephew 
 to the witty lawyer of that historic name. The 
 digression may not be an unwelcome one, if an 
 example be quoted of the rare readiness with 
 which the latter could toss off impromptu verses 
 at the spur of the moment ; for, Russell is pro- 
 bably the only man who could remember the 
 humorous lines here given, and which, so far 
 as he was aware, were never published. 
 
 Towards the end of last century, Carry 
 Ourry, a great Cornish beauty, and an ances- 
 tress of the Trebys, of Goodamoor, had walked 
 into the Assize Court at Bodmin, when Jekyll, 
 catching sight of her, wrote the following lines 
 and handed them up to the judge : 
 
 " My lord, and gemmen of the jury, 
 I come to prosecute before ye 
 A noted felon, I'll assure ye, 
 Known by the name of Carry Ourry ; 
 Known by a guilty pair of eyes, 
 Known by a thousand felonies, 
 Known to push her crime still further, 
 Guilty of killing, stabbing, murder ; 
 But to be brief and cut it shorter, 
 I'll but indict her for manslaughter." 
 
 The next morning, crossing the Bade at 
 Tarrsteps, and the wild heathery waste lying 
 between it and Exford, Russell threw his hounds 
 into the cover indicated by the farmer : in one 
 
THE RE V. JOHN RUSSELL. 277 
 
 minute a lot of cubs were on their legs ; then 
 followed a crash, till, on every side, the whole 
 cover seemed to be on fire. A brace of cubs 
 soon succumbed, and their brushes being handed 
 to the farmer, he carried them home in triumph 
 to his wife, declaring that now she would have 
 no further grievance to complain of, " leastways, 
 from they two foxes." 
 
 But Russell had not finished with them yet; 
 after a short pause, casting his hounds round 
 the outside of the cover, they dropped their 
 sterns and away they went, pelting like a storm 
 of hail after the old dog, twelve miles straight 
 on end, over the wildest part of Exmoor. On 
 reaching the Bray covers they were hard on his 
 back ; but Russell, fearing a change, deemed it 
 advisable to stop the pack ; and so the gallant 
 fellow lived to fight again another day : that 
 day, however, was not long deferred. 
 
 In the following November the new club 
 met for their fortnight's sport at South Molton; 
 and Yard Down being the first fixture, Mr. 
 Trelawny's hounds proceede4 to draw Sherra- 
 combe Brake, hard by, Russell, from a spot 
 of open ground on the opposite side of the 
 combe, stood watching the action of the hounds 
 
278 MEMOIR OP 
 
 intently, as, without a vestige of drag, Limpetty, 
 the huntsman, was doing his utmost to encourage 
 them to face the strong gorse that opposed their 
 entrance at every point. At length he passed 
 on to draw another cover ; but Russell stopped 
 him, shouting at the top of his voice 
 
 "You've left that fox behind you, Lim- 
 petty ! " 
 
 " No, I ha'nt," responded he, in the habitual 
 blunt, outspoken style that characterized the man. 
 
 " Yes, you have," repeated Russell ; " not a 
 hound has touched the comb of that hedge, and 
 he may be there." 
 
 At that moment a hound spoke, and almost 
 before Limpetty could look round, a screeching 
 " tally-ho " from one of the field announced a 
 view. The fox was on foot, a flyer too, beyond 
 all doubt, for the next instant he was out on the 
 open moor, a good lanyard clear of the brake. 
 
 " That's the same grey fox I know it is," 
 said Russell to Mr. Houlditch, who was stand- 
 ing near him at the time ; " the very fox I 
 brought away from Exford, twelve miles off, a 
 month ago." 
 
 Houlditch shook his head. 
 
 " I own, Russell," said he, "you know a 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 279 
 
 good many things ; but as to knowing that to 
 be the same fox you brought from Exford, you 
 must pardon me if I venture to doubt it." 
 
 It would have taken Russell more time than 
 was then convenient to explain his reasons for 
 expressing that opinion : he knew, too, it would 
 have been a mere waste of words on his part, 
 and that Houlditch would only have exemplified 
 the old saying 
 
 " He that complies against his will 
 Is of his own opinion still." 
 
 So, turning to Mrs. Russell, who was mounted 
 on her favourite horse, called "The Tickler," 
 he said 
 
 " Come along, Penelope, he's going for 
 Whitefield Down, and catch them we must, 
 or we shall never see them again." 
 
 Away they went up wind and over the hill 
 to Sittaborough, when, the pace being tremen- 
 dous, the fox turned and sank the wind down 
 for Simonsbath, then on to the Warren, Badge- 
 worthy, and up to Gallon House, where he broke 
 out over the moor wall, a boundary fence big 
 enough to stop the course of a native red deer. 
 
 And now it was that Mrs. Russell, a wee bit 
 anxious, perhaps, to rival the renown so justly 
 
280 MEMOIR OF 
 
 earned by Mrs. Horndon as a forward and 
 intrepid rider, not only "set" that lady, but 
 every man in the field : for, putting Tickler 
 without a moment's hesitation at the formidable 
 barrier, and landing safely over the deep trench 
 on the off side, away she went with the leading 
 hounds for a considerable distance, literally 
 alone in her glory. They were then within 
 less than a mile of the very cover, near Exford, 
 from which Russell had brought the dog-fox in 
 the previous month ; and he was now pointing 
 directly for it, when a terrific shower of hail 
 and rain fell like a waterspout around them* 
 washing away every particle of scent, and com- 
 pelling the baffled hounds to put down their 
 noses in vain. 
 
 So, this Hector of the moor, having once 
 beaten Russell's hounds, and again, by the 
 intervention of Jupiter himself, triumphed over 
 the crack pack of the South, was toasted that 
 night, during the symposium at the George Inn, 
 with mighty enthusiasm ; the identity of the 
 gallant animal being no longer questioned even 
 by the doubting Houlditch. 
 
 During these meetings at South Molton, 
 which continued to flourish under Russell's im- 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 281 
 
 mediate auspices for many successive years, it 
 was admitted on all sides by the Nestors of the 
 field, that the sport shown was fully equal to 
 that of the most brilliant period of the Chum- 
 leigh Hunt; and that it was due, in no small 
 measure, to a plan adopted by him with respect 
 to the main earths in the neighbourhood of the 
 moor, there can be no doubt. About a week 
 before each meeting, Will Rawle, his trusty 
 kennel-man, was regularly sent with a couple 
 of terriers, to rattle and turmoil every strong- 
 hold visited by the foxes, far and near. That 
 being thoroughly done, a few drops of a certain 
 strong-scenting liquid were sprinkled over the 
 entrance of each earth, which was then stopped. 
 The name of the liquid neither Russell nor 
 Will Rawle would ever divulge ; but its object 
 was to prevent the foxes from digging them- 
 selves in again, before the meeting had come to 
 a close. Directly afterwards, however, the earths 
 were unstopped, and allowed to assume, as they 
 soon did, their pristine and natural appearance. 
 The success of the plan exceeded even 
 Russell's expectations ; for, however stormy the 
 nights might have been, the foxes were not 
 only to be found above ground, but were un 
 
282 MEMOIR OF 
 
 doubtedly much bothered by the blockade so 
 ubiquitously maintained against them. They 
 proved this unmistakably, by the strange line 
 of country they were so often driven to take 
 a great advantage to the hounds which, day 
 after day, whether Russell's, Trelawny's, or Sir 
 Walter Carew's, rarely returned to their kennels 
 without showing a fine wild run, and crowning 
 it with a kill. 
 
 One day, a brace of foxes were found by 
 Sir Walter Carew's hounds, the first in Twitchen 
 Town Wood, the second near Lanacre Bridge, 
 and both were killed, the latter in forty, the 
 former in thirty-six minutes, without the shadow 
 of a check in either case from first to last, every 
 inch of the run being over the wild rough 
 heather of Exmoor; some idea may thus be 
 formed of the style of sport that, as a- rule, 
 marked the South Molton meetings at that 
 period. 
 
 Speaking of that day in particular, Sir 
 Walter Carew, a well-known man with the 
 Quorn about that time, and a rare judge of 
 hounds' pace, was wont to declare that he had 
 never seen two such brilliant runs in one day, 
 even in Leicestershire, or any other country. 
 
THE RE V. JOHN R US SELL. 283 
 
 Russell would have almost given the eyes 
 out of his head for a couple of bitches called 
 Beatrice and Barbara, which, figuring in front 
 and always abreast with the leading hounds, 
 distinguished themselves greatly in both runs. 
 Scarcely above twenty-one inches in height, 
 they were yet models of strength, length, and 
 symmetry ; dark tan, or, rather, hare-pied, in 
 colour, and never idle, they were, as Russell 
 had already discovered, equally good all round, 
 in chase, line-hunting, and road work. 
 
 A story went the rounds, but how it came 
 to be known will ever remain a mystery, that 
 he was heard to whisper the names of Beatrice 
 and Barbara in his dreams that night. It was 
 therefore shrewdly suspected that his object 
 was not altogether a disinterested one, when, 
 jogging alongside John Beale a few days after- 
 wards, he was reported to have said, " What a 
 pity 'tis, John, those hounds are not an inch or 
 two higher ; Sir Walter, I know, likes a level 
 lot, and the pack, I think, would look all the 
 better if he were to draft them." 
 
 " What ! draft they tew beauties, Mr. Ris- 
 sell ? " replied the veteran ; " nit he, if I 
 know'th it. Why, they'm the flower of the 
 
284 MEMOIR OF 
 
 flock, they be, and will do more work in a day 
 than some hounds in a wick." 
 
 Sir Walter, too, prized Beatrice and Bar- 
 bara as the pearls of his pack ; but not more, 
 perhaps, for their intrinsic merits than for the 
 blood they carried in their veins. He had bred 
 them himself at Haccombe, and being from his 
 Bashful by Mr. BulteeFs Justice, a son of the 
 famous Beaufort hound of that name, they had 
 come from a sort stout as steel on both sides, 
 and real hard drivers, even on a half scent. 
 Consequently, the Furrier blood could scarcely 
 have been more valued by Osbaldeston, nor 
 that of the Warwickshire Trojan by Mr. Cor- 
 bet, than the strain of those hounds by Sir 
 Walter Carew. 
 
 The South Molton Club acquired in a short 
 time immense popularity throughout the county, 
 and the names of the members and visitors who 
 supported its merry meetings are for the most 
 part included in the following list: Sir Walter P. 
 Carew, Sir Arthur Chichester, Sir John Duntze, 
 Messrs. Charles Trelawny, J. Russell, Frederick 
 and Charles Knight, William Horndon, James 
 and Henry Deacon, John King, of Fowels- 
 combe, William and Henry Rayer, T. Carew, of 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 285 
 
 Collipriest, W. B. Fortescue, William Erving S. 
 Clark, Walter C. Radcliffe, R. S. Bryan, Joseph 
 Jekyll, Colwell Roe, Stucley Lucas, H. Tyrrel, 
 G. Woodleigh, Rev. George Owen, Chichester 
 and Chichester Nagle, Houlditch, Sleeman, 
 E. W. L. Davies, William Hole, Courtenay 
 Bulteel, Kingson, Willesford, Edwin Scoble, 
 Bassett, Pinkett, Sherard Clay, J, Bawden, 
 Reginald James and his brother, Karslake, 
 Dene, two Riccards, and Bury Russell. 
 
 To this imperfect list might be added a host 
 of hard-riding farmers, with George Toms at 
 their head, whose devotion to fox-hunting and 
 the master of the hunt it would be difficult to 
 match in any other country. 
 
 After a fine day's sport over those heathery, 
 scent-holding moors, when the whole party, 
 " amid brightening bumpers " elated, with 
 Trelawny, John King, or Russell for their 
 chairman, were discussing the incidents of the 
 run, and killing their fox over and over again, 
 then it was that the " fun of the fair" began. 
 The ring of a shilling popped into a wine glass 
 gave notice that, with or without the knowledge 
 of the owner, the sale by auction of his horse 
 was about to take place, he himself being only 
 
286 MEMOIR OF 
 
 allowed one bid ; so that, if satisfied with the 
 price offered, and he said nothing, his horse 
 then became the property of the last bidder ; 
 but if, on the contrary, he had no wish to part 
 with the animal, he took care to protect himself 
 by naming a sum that at once put an end to 
 further competition, 
 
 A chestnut pony by Pandarus, called 
 " Stunning Joe," scarcely fourteen hands high, 
 had so distinguished himself over the moor 
 during these meetings, that on two or three 
 occasions he was persistently put up, and large 
 sums were bid for him with the hope of obtaining 
 so rare an animal. But Reginald James, his 
 owner, knew the value of the little horse too 
 well to part with him ; for, when the bidding 
 had risen to its top figure an exceptionally 
 high one he invariably took a jump which at 
 once extinguished the aspirations of the most 
 spirited competitors. 
 
 A young squire, however, from the southern 
 division of the county, who had indulged rather 
 in " the flow of soul," than " the feast of 
 reason," took, on one festive night, so active a 
 part in the matter of bidding for his neighbours' 
 property that, on awaking the next morning, he 
 
THE RE V. JOHN RUSSELL. 287 
 
 found himself in possession of a " string" of 
 nags which, as his groom was heard to say, 
 "he no more wanted than a cat wanted two 
 tails." 
 
 Another gentleman, the Rev. Thomas Carew, 
 father to the present Squire of Collipriest, at 
 the end of one meeting lamented to Russell 
 that he had not a horse left to ride home on : 
 " I came here," he said, " with six useful horses ; 
 and now I'm left with a pocketful of money, but 
 without a single horse : I should like to buy 
 them all back again." 
 
 Russell, as before stated, preferring early 
 rest and an unclouded brain for the full enjoy- 
 ment of the morrow, rarely remained in the 
 guest-chamber to a late hour ; nor could the 
 most pressing request prevail on him to take a 
 hand at whist at these meetings, or indeed on 
 any other occasion. " I've no money to lose 
 myself," he would say, " and should be very 
 sorry to risk injuring my neighbour by winning 
 his." But if there was one festive attraction 
 which he could not resist, and which fairly 
 glued him to his seat, it was that of a hunting 
 song and if trolled forth by that most hearty 
 and genial of men, Walter Radcliffe, of War- 
 
288 MEMOIR OF 
 
 leigh, Russell would remain a willing and 
 delighted listener to the very last note. 
 
 There was one song especially, written by 
 Radcliffe himself, which, from the clear and 
 stirring style in which he sang it, never failed 
 to elicit rounds of applause, not only from 
 Russell, but from every member of that jovial 
 board. It was called " The Ivybridge Hunt- 
 Song," and described a run with the Lyneham 
 then Mr. Bulteel's so graphically that, if 
 published, it would be found little, if at all, 
 inferior to the best hunting songs, either of 
 Mr. Egerton-Warburton or Mr. Whyte-Melville. 
 To not a few of our readers, too, it would bring 
 back to memory the bright scenes of a bygone 
 day ay, and the form of many a kind familiar 
 face ; of many an old friend long passed away, 
 but still, to the mind's eye, blessed with the 
 same unclouded brow, the same happy features 
 which then, in the morning of life, 
 
 " Joy used to wear." 
 
 At one meeting of the club, which can 
 never be forgotten by those who were present, 
 a lively passage of arms took place between 
 Russell and Radcliffe, not exactly in singing 
 
THE RE V. JOHN R US SELL. 289 
 
 songs, but in telling Devonshire stories, which 
 they told alternately. 
 
 Radcliffe's stories chiefly turned on a 
 Cornish Squireen, whose eccentricities of 
 character and speech were imitated to the life. 
 This gentleman dearly loved fox-hunting, and 
 possessing a clever " whit-faced horse," which 
 carried him brilliantly over Roughtor and 
 Brown willy, he valued him more than gold. 
 Being attacked by serious illness, which brought 
 him face to face with an enemy he could no 
 longer escape, and having lived a free-and-easy 
 kind of life, with more thought for the present 
 than for a future world, the clergyman of his 
 parish deemed it his duty to visit him, and im- 
 press him with a serious view of his coming end. 
 
 " You are going on a long journey, sir," said 
 the good parson, " and surely you should make 
 some preparation for it, before it be too late." 
 
 " I've no wish to travel," replied the sick 
 man ; "this place suits me well enough." 
 
 " But, sir, 'tis to a better country I would 
 direct your thoughts, where " 
 
 " A better country, did you say?" inter- 
 rupted the other, impatiently. " Give me only 
 a thousand a year and my old whit-faced horse, 
 
 19 
 
290 MEMOIR OF 
 
 and I'd never wish to see a better country than 
 our Cornish moors." 
 
 Finding him impracticable, the parson took 
 his leave, with manifest but unavailing "signs 
 of sorrow." 
 
 In a very short time afterwards, being 
 dressed in his top boots and scarlet hunting- 
 coat, he was carried down to a settle near the 
 kitchen fire, where, as volumes of smoke curled 
 up from his lighted pipe, the spirit of this hardy 
 Cornishman passed away, and, let us hope, in 
 spite of himself, took its flight to a better land. 
 
 To give even a sketch of the many amusing 
 stories that were fired off in rapid succession 
 by the one or the other, in that continuous fusil- 
 lade, would be to fill a small volume ; nor, at 
 this distance of time, would it be a light task 
 to gather together the fragments of that memor- 
 able encounter. One or two of Russell's, 
 however, bearing on Devonshire parish-clerks 
 in his early days, when George III. was king, 
 can scarcely have escaped the memory of any 
 one who was fortunate enough to hear them 
 then told as they were by him with infinite 
 humour and in the purest vernacular of that 
 favoured county. 
 
THE RE V. JOHN R US SELL. 29 1 
 
 John Boyce, the rector of Sherwell, wishing 
 to have a day's hunting with the staghounds 
 on the Porlock side of the moor, told his clerk 
 to give notice in the morning that there would 
 be no service in the afternoon at their church, 
 as he was going off to hunt with Sir Thomas 
 Acland over the moor on the following day. 
 The mandate was obeyed to the letter, the 
 clerk making the announcement in the follow- 
 ing terms : 
 
 " This is vor to give notiss there be no 
 sarvice to this church this arternewn ; cans' 
 maester is a-going over the moor a stag-hunt- 
 ing wi' Sir Thomas." 
 
 Again, at Stockleigh-Pomeroy parish, the 
 rector, Roope Ilbert, a well-known name in 
 Devonshire, desired his clerk to give notice 
 that there would be one service a day only at 
 that church for a month, as he was going to take 
 duty at Stockleigh-English alternately with his 
 own. The clerk did so in the following words : 
 
 " This is vor to give notiss there'll be no 
 sarvice to thes church but wance a wick, caus* 
 maester's a-going to sarve t'other Stockleigh 
 and thes church to all-etarnity." 
 
 It seems to have been a very common 
 
292 MEMOIR OF 
 
 fashion in Devonshire, in Russell's early days, 
 for gentlemen of standing in the county to 
 adopt the native dialect, especially when con- 
 versing with the country-folk a habit arising 
 either from carelessness, or perhaps because 
 their speech in that provincial form was best 
 understood and most natural to the generality 
 of their neighbours. Russell relates, for in- 
 stance, that he was present when a colonel of 
 the North Devon Militia was reviewing his 
 regiment, and seeing a hare jump up in the 
 midst of the men, he shouted out wildly, " There 
 he go'th, boys, a lashing great shaver." Then, 
 forgetting the exact point at which he had 
 ceased to give the word of command, he turned 
 round and said, " Where wor I, drummer-boy ? " 
 
 " Present arms, sir," responded the youth ; 
 and the inspection went on. 
 
 Again, a yeomanry regiment were enacting 
 a sham fight amongst themselves, when a Cap- 
 tain Prettyjohn was ordered to retreat before a 
 charge of the enemy. " Retrait ! what doth that 
 mane?" inquired the captain. "Retrait mean'th 
 rinning away, I zim ; then, it shall never be 
 told up to Dodbrook Market that Cap'n 
 Prid'gen and his brave troop rinned away." 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 293 
 
 Accordingly, as the enemy came on, bearing 
 down upon him at a rapid trot, he shouted to 
 his troop, " Charge, my brave boys, charge ; us 
 bain't voxes, and they bain't hounds ; us'll face 
 'em like men." 
 
 The collision was awful men, horses, and 
 accoutrements strewing the ground on every 
 side ; several troopers being more or less in- 
 jured, while one positively refused to mount 
 again, saying, " I've a brok'd my breeches 
 already, Cap'n, and I won't mount no more." 
 
 The last time Russell heard Lord 
 
 speak, was at a Chumleigh meeting ; when, 
 being called upon to give a toast, he did so in 
 the following words : " Gen'lemen, I wish to 
 propose a toast ; and that there is this here, 
 ' Fox-hunting.' ' 
 
 But these Devonshire stories should be 
 heard to be fully appreciated ; for, seasoned and 
 served up as they were by Russell and Rad- 
 cliffe, with all the trimmings and peculiarities 
 of the purest native accent, their piquancy is 
 absolutely lost lacking such condiments. 
 
 No schoolboy ever enjoyed his hours of 
 play more than Russell did these South Molton 
 meetings, the lively and pleasant sociality of 
 
294 MEMOIR OF 
 
 which, independently of the day's sport, was in 
 no small measure due to the sparkling gaiety 
 and telling effect of his own conversational 
 power a power not only of saying things 
 humorously, but of communicating the humour 
 to all around him. The hearty dinner which 
 he rarely failed to make after the severest run, 
 seemed rather to stimulate his social energies 
 than suffer them to subside into that somno- 
 lescent mood which, with ordinary mortals, is 
 so apt to follow a full meal after a hard day's 
 work. Nor, till his head was on his pillow, did 
 he ever indulge in a wink of sleep ; but then, 
 once there, ordinarily he slept like a top. 
 " Tria sunt necessaria ad humanam vitam ; 
 cibus, somnus et jocus," was the favourite say- 
 ing of a sensible Archbishop in former days ; 
 and certainly, if any one ever did full justice 
 to each and all of those three requirements, 
 Russell was that man. 
 
 The business of the day being over, and the 
 Homeric feast duly disposed of, then com- 
 menced the 
 
 " Sport that wrinkled care derides, 
 And laughter holding both his sides ; " 
 
 then flashes of humour and good-fellowship 
 
THE RE V. JOHN R US SELL. 295 
 
 enjoyed their full swing, and literally reigned 
 supreme. So Dr. Doran was quite right when 
 he said, " A good dinner sharpens wit ; while a 
 hungry man is as slow at a joke as he is at a 
 favour." 
 
 " On one occasion, and one only," writes an 
 old member of the club, " do I remember a 
 breach of the peace taking place at those merry 
 meetings. Somebody, utterly ignoring that 
 precept of St. Peter, which warns us not to 
 ' speak evil of dignities,' was abusing the 
 Bishop of Exeter (Phillpotts) in round terms, 
 when a young squire (Tom Carew, of Colli- 
 priest), a staunch friend and admirer of that 
 stout-hearted prelate, seized a pound of butter 
 and threw it with all his force at the speaker's 
 head. ' There ! take that,' he said ; ' and 
 don't attack in his absence a better man than 
 yourself; I'll not hear him abused by you or 
 any other man with impunity ! ' 
 
 To most men whose years have been chiefly 
 spent amid the stirring scenes of a sportsman's 
 life, some adventures have occurred which, 
 being so exceptional in their character, can 
 scarcely be written or related without causing 
 the shadow of doubt to darken their credibility. 
 
296 MEMOIR OF 
 
 Many such have happened to Russell ; but 
 there is one he is wont to tell, which, at any 
 risk, claims a passing notice in this memoir. 
 It is the story of a wild fox taking his prey 
 while hotly pursued by hounds a circumstance 
 not likely to be forgotten by the Rev. J. Bryan, 
 the rector of Cliddesden, near Basingstoke, as 
 he was present on that occasion. 
 
 Russell had found a fox one fine-scenting 
 morning on the outskirts of the moor, and was 
 bringing him at a trimming pace over the wide 
 heathery waste of Hawkridge Common, and 
 thence into the hanging woods that crown the 
 Barle with such majestic scenery, when Russell's 
 ear was attracted by the wild screams of a 
 woman, apparently in the greatest distress. 
 The hounds at that moment were running 
 exactly in the direction of the hubbub ; and as 
 Russell rode up to the spot, he beheld a 
 woman rushing frantically after them, and 
 catching sight of him, she exclaimed in a 
 voice of agony, "Oh! Mr. Rissell ! that there 
 fox hath a tookt away our little specklety hen ; 
 I seed un snap un up, and away to go, I 
 did!"- 
 
 "Then," said Russell, "I'll kill him and 
 
THE RE V. JOHN R US SELL. 297 
 
 give you another hen;" and on he went with 
 the hounds. 
 
 The woman was the wife of a poor charcoal- 
 burner, living in a turf cabin, and passing a 
 lonely existence in the solitude of those wild 
 woods. On that one hen and her lively cackle, 
 announcing the good news of a fresh-laid egg, 
 depended, perhaps for days together, her sole 
 supply of animal food : it had been as a pet 
 lamb to her ; had shared the crumbs of her 
 scanty meal, and had been her companion in 
 many a lonesome hour, when no other living 
 creature was near. 
 
 But the avengers were on his track; and, 
 with no refuge at hand, die he must for his 
 heartless theft. And die he did directly after- 
 wards, for, within two gunshots of the spot, just 
 over the Barle, the hounds ran into him ; while 
 the dishevelled carcase of the "poor little 
 specklety hen," still warm with life, was picked 
 up by the disconsolate owner, bringing the deed 
 home, without a shadow of doubt, to the rapa- 
 city of that hunted fox. 
 
 Here, however, Russell's sport was well- 
 nigh brought to a serious and untimely end. 
 horse Rattler," he writes, "in crossing 
 
298 MEMOIR OF 
 
 the Barle, which was much swollen, missed 
 his footing among the rocks, and, being carried 
 off his legs, rolled headlong into the river, 
 leaving me to get out as best I could a 
 labour of no little difficulty ; but, with the assis- 
 tance of Houlditch, a couple of masons, and a 
 long pole, I escaped with only a good ducking. 
 The old horse, however, would not leave the 
 river till he had drunk his fill at least three 
 pails of water. We found in Twitchen Town 
 Wood, ran him to South Molton, six miles ; 
 back through the same wood again and then 
 straight over the Holland and Anstey com- 
 mons, to the Barle, under Jekyll's house : time, 
 one hour and forty minutes, without a check, 
 and no harm happened to Rattler, notwith- 
 standing his copious libation." 
 
 It will be anticipated that Russell did not for- 
 get to return to the hut, and console the woman, 
 not only with an immediate half-crown, but with 
 the promise of another hen at an early date. 
 
 " Dining at the late Sir Robert Sheffield's, 
 at Normanby, some years ago," writes an old 
 friend of Russell's, " I met Lord Henry Ben- 
 tinck ; and the subject of conversation turning 
 on the habits of wild foxes, I related a story 
 
THE RE V. JOHN R US SELL. 299 
 
 told me by Mr. John King, of Fowelscombe, 
 the circumstances of which he witnessed when 
 Master of the Hambledon hounds. He had 
 been running a fox merrily for upwards of forty 
 minutes ; and coming up to a farmyard, by 
 which he was making a short cut, he saw the 
 fox dash into a flock of ducks, seize a mallard 
 just below the green of his neck, and carry him 
 off across a large field ; when, the hounds run- 
 ning into him, Mr. King picked up the mallard, 
 then quivering in its last gasp, and restored it 
 to its owner. 
 
 " ' Mr. King must be a bold man to tell 
 such a story,' remarked Lord Henry, dryly, as 
 if he utterly disbelieved it. 
 
 " ' I had the pleasure of knowing Mr. King 
 intimately,' replied I ; ' and he was a man quite 
 as unlikely to tell an untruth as your lordship ; ' 
 a rejoinder that brought the conversation to an 
 abrupt close. 
 
 " Years afterwards I repeated to Russell 
 what Lord Henry had said ; on which he re- 
 plied, * I only wish I had been there ; I could 
 have told his lordship that a very similar cir- 
 cumstance happened to myself (that of the char- 
 coal-burner's little specklety hen), and I think 
 
300 MEMOIR OF 
 
 he would have been the bold man, had he 
 doubted that fact.' ' 
 
 Russell's thoughts must have carried him 
 back, at that instant, to the time when he 
 blacked Bulteel's eye at Plympton School ; or, 
 later on, perhaps, to those days of muscular 
 Christianity at Oxford, when, if any one had 
 been rash enough to doubt his word, or that of 
 his friend Denne, either of them would have 
 knocked him down like a ninepin on a skittle- 
 alley. Still, it must be owned that antics like 
 these by foxes, when hunted, are most, excep- 
 tional ; two or three only having been witnessed 
 once, during each of their lives, by men of such 
 long and varied experience as Mr. King and 
 the subject of this memoir. 
 
 Another incident is equally remarkable : 
 " During a Chumleigh meeting," said Russell, 
 " I was enjoying a day's sport with Sir Walter 
 Carew's hounds. They found I forget exactly 
 where and were running him sharply near 
 Romansleigh village, when I saw the fox catch 
 up a large yellow cat in his mouth and carry 
 him on as far as I could view him. The fox 
 was killed, but what became of the poor cat 
 I am unable to say." 
 
THE RE V. JOHN R US SELL. 30 1 
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 The South Motion Meetings Limpetty, Mr. Trelaivny's Hunts- 
 man^ rides over a Flood-Hatch on "Jack Sheppard" Russell 
 ceases to be a Master of Hounds His Long Devotion to the 
 " Antient Sport of Kings '' A Brief Sketch of the Staghounds 
 A Barrister and his gallant Grey brought to grief in an 
 Exmoor Bog Anecdote of Hind and Calf. 
 
 " Magnificent creature ! so stately and bright ! 
 In the pride of thy spirit pursuing thy flight ! 
 For what hath the child of the desert to dread, 
 Wafting up his own mountains the far-beaming head ; 
 Or borne like a whirlwind down on the vale ! 
 Hail ! king of the wild and the beautiful hail ! 
 * : '.**# 
 
 In the wide raging torrent that lends thee its roar 
 In the cliff that once trod must be trodden no more 
 Thy trust, 'mid the dangers that threaten thy reign : 
 But what if the stag on the mountain be slain ? 
 On the brink of the rock Ib ! he standeth at bay, 
 Like a victor that falls at the close of the day." 
 
 JOHN WILSON. 
 
 UNDER the immediate auspices of Russell him- 
 self, backed up by Mr. Trelawny and Sir 
 Walter Carew, the meetings at South Molton 
 continued to flourish, season after season, with 
 
302 MEMOIR OF 
 
 unqualified success ; the stout foxes, the unde- 
 niable hounds, and the rough heathery wastes, 
 over which the chase from day to day swept 
 like a hurricane, giving a wild character to the 
 sport, and establishing its popularity throughout 
 the western counties. Consequently, from all 
 quarters between the Quantock Hills and the 
 Bodmin Moors, between the South Hams and 
 Hartland Point, every man who possessed a 
 horse and loved hunting found himself, sooner 
 or later, partaking as a guest, if not as a 
 member, of the attractive and varied menu 
 provided by that club. 
 
 Of course, a considerable amount of rivalry 
 was exhibited, ever and anon, among sundry of 
 the partisans attached to the three hunts, not 
 only as to the merits of the respective packs 
 and the style in which their work was done, but 
 with reference to the staying powers of the 
 horses and feats of audacious horsemanship 
 performed by their riders. One gentleman, for 
 instance, a member of Russell's hunt, was so 
 determined not to be beaten or outdone by any 
 competitor, native or stranger, that he rode in 
 the most reckless manner, charging without a 
 scruple of fear the most impracticable fences, 
 
THE RE V. JOHN RUSSELL. 303 
 
 and shouting to his horse as he did so, " L'un 
 oil, rautre;" meaning that his own neck, or 
 that of his steed, must be risked at such a time. 
 It was his watchword, like that of a Knight 
 Templar entering the lists ; and so fiercely did 
 he use the portentous motto, when the fence 
 was an ugly one, that long after his own name 
 had been forgotten by the members of Mr. 
 Trelawny's hunt he was always spoken of and 
 readily remembered as that daring rider " Uun 
 ou rautre" 
 
 From the southern side of the county by 
 none, perhaps, was this rivalry in riding carried 
 to a higher pitch than, much against his wish, 
 by Mr. Trelawny's servants. Limpetty, the 
 huntsman, on a wonderful little animal called 
 Jack Sheppard, was utterly uncontrollable on 
 such occasions ; go he would, if hounds were 
 running hard, at a castle wall or over the mouth 
 of a coal-pit ; while poor Jack Gumming, the 
 whip, who afterwards broke his neck with the 
 Grafton hounds, if not under the immediate eye 
 of his master, was equally fearless and equally 
 headstrong. 
 
 On one occasion, Russell had intimated to 
 Mr. Trelawny that, if he met at Cuzzicombe 
 
304 MEMOIR OF 
 
 Post and drew an acre of gorse hard by, he 
 would probably find a flyer. Accordingly, 
 meeting there, a trimming run after Trelawny's 
 own heart one of forty minutes proved to 
 be the happy result. The fox was in view, the 
 hounds running into him and Limpetty " home 
 to their sterns," when a barrier interposed, 
 which no man with a heart less intrepid than 
 his own would have dared to encounter. It 
 was a flood-hatch, broad, deep, and dangerous ; 
 and a thrilling sight it was to see him on Jack 
 Sheppard flying over it, like a dragon on 
 wings, looking back as he did so over his 
 shoulder, and singing out to Jack Cumming, 
 " Where be they Knights to, now, I should like 
 to knaw ?" alluding to Mr. Frederick and Lewis 
 Knight, of Simonsbath ; two well-known bril- 
 liant performers over any country, but especially 
 hard to catch over Exmoor. 
 
 Paradoxical though it may appear, never 
 were the prospects of fox-hunting brighter in 
 the north of Devon than when those happy and 
 successful meetings at South Molton were at 
 length brought to a close. For the flame that 
 had first kindled them, and the fuel on which 
 they had fed, had neither burned out nor 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 305 
 
 smouldered away ; but, on the contrary, had 
 spread with a vitality that laid hold of the heart 
 of the country, and continued to gain fresh 
 vigour in every succeeding year. 
 
 After the expiration of that club it is not a 
 little remarkable that, within a circuit of thirty 
 miles, taking Russell's country as a centre, two 
 or three packs, whose fame had hitherto been 
 little known beyond the limits of the western 
 counties, should have rapidly acquired a pro- 
 minence which, in point of blood, looks, and 
 efficiency, would have borne a comparison with 
 the most renowned packs of the present age. 
 
 In the Chumleigh country, for example, the 
 hounds of the present Earl of Portsmouth, soon 
 after his accession to the title, speedily assumed 
 a very different aspect from that of former 
 days ; insomuch that the pack has since been 
 pronounced, by no mean judge, to be " infinitely 
 superior to anything that has ever been seen in 
 the West of England ; their hunting attributes 
 being on a par with their other merits." 
 
 Living within twenty miles of Eggesford, 
 and hunting with that pack on every available 
 occasion, Russell must have known the history 
 and character of every individual hound in it 
 
 20 
 
306 MEMOIR OF 
 
 almost as well as the huntsman himself ; more- 
 over, being on the most friendly terms with 
 Lord Portsmouth, even from his earliest youth, 
 who so competent, who so ready as Russell, if 
 consulted by him, to aid the young master with 
 all the judgment and experience of his riper 
 years ? 
 
 That his lordship did so consult him in the 
 first days of his hunting career is quite certain ; 
 although from his early association with a 
 kennel, his hereditary love of hounds, and the 
 power of close observation he has since shown 
 with respect to the breeding and selection of 
 puppies, Lord Portsmouth's judgment must 
 very soon have developed into maturity, and 
 needed little help from any man, even from 
 Russell himself. And as to his knowledge of 
 hunting, it is not very long since that, at a large 
 breakfast-party given by Mr. Trelawny, Russell 
 was asked by a gentleman present which of the 
 two he considered the better sportsman, the 
 Duke of Beaufort or Lord Portsmouth ? His 
 reply was, " They are the two best in England 
 you cannot give a wrinkle to either ; and if 
 I place the Duke of Beaufort first, it is only in 
 deference to his rank." 
 
THE RE V. JOHN R US SELL. 307 
 
 Again, in West Devon, the Honourable 
 Mark Rolle, on the retirement of Mr. John 
 Moore Stevens in 1858, took possession of 
 the Torrington country ; and, with the help of 
 some valuable hounds from the Cleveland and 
 Rufford kennels, established by degrees the 
 noble pack which has since attained so much 
 celebrity. 
 
 Then, about the same time, there arose a 
 third pack, which, started by Lord Poltimore, 
 with Russell as his chief counsellor, acquired so 
 wide-spread a fame during the short time they 
 hunted the country that, when they were sold, 
 the price they fetched astonished even " Tom 
 Pain" himself. His lordship, in reference to 
 the subject of this memoir, thus writes of him : 
 "When I first began keeping hounds, in 1857, 
 he taught me much, and was of the greatest 
 possible assistance to me ; but, on removing 
 into Dorsetshire and taking my hounds with 
 me, I then saw less of him, except when he 
 came on his annual visits, than in former days. 
 His intuitive knowledge of the run of a fox, 
 even in a country strange to Russell, was mar- 
 vellous. I remember well that, on one occasion 
 in Dorset, after a fast and straight run from 
 
308 MEMOIR OF 
 
 Thresher's Gorse, in the Buckland Vale, over 
 the Monument country, the fox was headed 
 and the hounds brought to a slight check. At 
 that moment a fresh fox was halloed ahead, 
 while some of the field who viewed him did 
 their best to get the hounds on to his line. 
 Russell never moved ; and some one remarking 
 that he was taking matters very coolly (being 
 so well placed in so good a run up to that 
 point), he quietly answered, ' The hunted fox is 
 behind ; that is a fresh fox.' My huntsman 
 was of the same opinion; and while .he was 
 making his cast, I viewed the hunted fox, 
 which had laid ,down ; we g ot on him again, 
 and, in a sharp burst of ten minutes more, 
 rolled him over in the open. Many of the field 
 a large one had galloped off to the halloa 
 of the fresh fox, and, being on those downs 
 where hounds can race, were thrown out, nor 
 did they make their appearance till many 
 minutes after the fox was killed. One man on 
 coming up remarked to my huntsman, * Where 
 have you been ? Why didn't you come to my 
 halloa ? ' ' Eating my fox,' was the answer ; 
 Russell, who was close by, adding to the man, 
 ' I told you, sir, it was a fresh fox you halloed ; 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 309 
 
 the hunted fox was headed, and had laid down 
 behind us.' ' 
 
 That the extra impetus thus given to fox- 
 hunting in the north of Devon may be attri- 
 buted in no small degree to Russell's example, 
 energy, and never-failing advocacy in its favour, 
 no one conversant with its past and present 
 history can for a moment doubt. Among all 
 classes now, from the peer to the peasant in 
 that country, the one feeling is to respect a fox ; 
 whereas, in the early days of Russell's career, 
 as already shown, the very church bells were 
 used not only to announce public worship, or 
 the passing away of a Christian's soul, but the 
 death-knell of a fox. 
 
 It is on record, that Mr. Mervyn Marshall, 
 while attending divine service at Welcome 
 Church, near Clovelly, a fall of snow having 
 occurred during the night, was not a little 
 startled by a man putting his head twice inside 
 the church door, and shouting aloud each time, 
 " I've a-got un" ; on which almost every man 
 of the congregation, knowing a fox had been 
 traced to ground, seized his hat and quitted the 
 church. 
 
 No such barbarisms exist in the north of 
 
310 MEMOIR OF 
 
 Devon at present ; bells do no more than the 
 legitimate work for which their pious donors 
 intended them no more than that most de- 
 voted campanologist, the Rev. H. T. Ella- 
 combe, could wish ; and as for foxes, they have 
 fair play shown them, and if they can only 
 beat hounds, they live in no danger of worse 
 enemies. 
 
 Fox-hunting, therefore, being now estab- 
 lished on a sound and satisfactory footing 
 throughout the north of Devon, Russell, in 
 1871, parted with his last pack, as the reader 
 is already aware, to that distinguished sports- 
 man, Mr. H. Villebois, of Marham Hall, Nor- 
 folk ; and thenceforth he ceased to be a Master 
 of Hounds. It was a wrench, however, which 
 told upon him painfully at the time, and it 
 could hardly have been otherwise ; he had kept 
 hounds, lived with them, and hunted them him- 
 self for half a century, nor did the old love 
 cease, for many a day afterwards, to assert its 
 long and strong hold on Russell's heart. 
 
 Still, there were not a few among his old 
 friends who refused to believe that life, apart 
 from the company of his hounds, could be 
 longer enjoyed by him ; and who consequently 
 
THE RE V. JOHN R US SELL. 3 1 1 
 
 urged him, though in the seventy-sixth year of 
 his age, to take to them again. But this time, 
 much as he missed them under the old tree at 
 Tordown, he remained firm. 
 
 As a scientific master of woodcraft, his great 
 points may be thus summarized : A thorough 
 knowledge of the wild animal and his habits ; 
 his mode of drawing covers and finding his fox, 
 working him in big woodlands incessantly, so 
 that he was a beaten fox before he went away ; 
 letting his hounds alone at a check, and when 
 they failed, making a grand cast on the line far 
 ahead, his intuition as to the run of a fox guid- 
 ing him aright in almost every case. His com- 
 mand over hounds two or three of which he 
 always had near him so that with a tricky fox 
 in a deep woodland, the moment he caught a 
 view he could clap them on instantly. By this 
 method he often drove a fox away from his old 
 haunts and country, and so forced a run on a 
 strange line a grand point in favour of hounds. 
 Then, his feeding he knew the constitution of 
 every hound in his kennel. 
 
 So far, then, as to Russell's life with his 
 own hounds ; but there is another and a no less 
 remarkable phase of it his long devotion to 
 
312 MEMOIR OF 
 
 the " Antient Sport of Kings " a phase which, 
 before we part with him, claims to be seen and 
 described, however imperfectly, through the 
 medium of this memoir. 
 
 With the exception of that memorable day, 
 the 3Oth of September, 1814, when, with Lord 
 Fortescue's hounds, Russell saw his first red 
 deer found at Pad wells ; and then, after a thrill- 
 ing chase, helped to collar the noble beast in 
 the depths of the roaring Bade, no allusion has 
 been as yet made to his love of stag-hunting, 
 a sport he followed through a long life with 
 an ardour worthy of a boy always fresh but 
 never sated, and with an untiring consistency 
 positively unparalleled. Mr. Charles Palk 
 Collyns, of Dulverton, long looked upon as the 
 Nestor of the moor, hunted, he tells us, " with 
 the staghounds for forty-six years " ; while the 
 experience of Mr. Boyse, of Withypoole, his 
 predecessor as a chronicler of that sport, does 
 not appear to have extended beyond forty 
 years, that is, from 1776 to 1816, when Mr. 
 Collyns took up the running, and " regularly 
 noted the chases " down to 1 860. 
 
 Russell, then, dating his entry from 1814, 
 with constant attendance, season after season, 
 
THE RE V. JOHN R US SELL. 3 1 3 
 
 from that day to 1882, a period of sixty- 
 eight years, had a far longer experience with 
 that noble and unique sport than either of 
 those gentlemen. 
 
 Accordingly, down to that year, Russell, 
 it appears, followed the chase of the wild red 
 deer under at least a dozen different dynasties ; 
 the following being a recorded list of the 
 masters, and the dates of their succession, 
 during that period : 
 
 In 1812 the late Lord Fortescue became 
 Master of the Staghounds for the second time ; 
 but resigned them again in 1818, during which 
 period of six years, as before stated, they killed 
 ninety deer forty-two stags and forty-eight 
 hinds. 
 
 Mr. Stucley Lucas, of Baron's Down, next 
 took the command ; his tenure of office being 
 also brought to a close at the end of six years, 
 when, in 1825, to Russell's great regret, the 
 old-fashioned staghounds a grand pack, that 
 stood nearly twenty-seven inches high, and for 
 more than a century had been bred expressly 
 for that sport were sold at Tattersall's, and 
 for ever lost to the country. " They went to 
 Germany," writes Russell ; " but I kept three 
 
314 MEMOIR OF 
 
 bitches for twelve months, hoping some one 
 would begin again ; then, having only ^80 a 
 year to live upon, I gave them to ' Smash 
 Lewis ' for a Welsh friend of his, a Mr. John 
 Dillwyn Llewelyn, of Penllergare, near Swansea; 
 and thirty years afterwards I picked out their 
 descendants in his kennel." 
 
 With all Russell's love for the dash of a fox- 
 hound, he regarded those magnificent hounds 
 with the most unbounded admiration ; declaring 
 them to have been, as they certainly were, 
 peculiarly adapted for the chase of the wild red 
 deer ; so perfect were they in water, so driving 
 on scent, and so sonorous in tongue the latter, 
 indeed, reminding him of a tenor bell, 
 
 " Over some wide-water'd shore, 
 Swinging slow with sullen roar." 
 
 Mr. Colly ns, too, was in despair at their loss, 
 and speaks of it with almost tearful regret : " A 
 nobler pack of hounds," he says, " no man ever 
 saw alas ! that they should now be consigned 
 to the kennel of a German baron ! For 
 courage, strength, speed and tongue, they were 
 unrivalled. Like the game they pursued, they 
 never appeared to be putting forth all their 
 
THE RE V. JOHN R US SELL. 3 1 5 
 
 powers of speed, and yet few horses could live 
 with them on the open. Their rarest quality, 
 perhaps, was their sagacity in hunting in the 
 water every pebble, every overhanging bush 
 or twig which the deer might have touched, was 
 quested as they passed up or down the stream, 
 and the crash with which the scent, if detected, 
 was acknowledged and announced, made the 
 whole country echo again. 
 
 " Nor must I forget to notice the staunch- 
 ness with which they pursued their game, even 
 when the scent had been stained by the deer 
 passing through a herd of his own species, 
 or through fallow-deer in a park. Wonder- 
 ful, indeed, was the unerring instinct they 
 displayed in carrying on the scent, disregard- 
 ing the lines, which, spreading right and left 
 around the track of the hunted deer, would, 
 it might well be supposed, have been fatal to 
 their power of keeping on the foot of their 
 quarry." 
 
 Again, " The importance of the two qualifi- 
 cations of staghounds above mentioned, viz., 
 sagacity in hunting in the water, and staunch- 
 ness in pursuing a hunted deer through the 
 herd and upon stained ground, is well known to 
 
316 MEMOIR OF 
 
 every man accustomed to the sport. They are 
 important, nay, indispensable, in consequence 
 of the habits of the deer ; for a stag is seldom, 
 I might almost say never, roused without 
 ' taking soil * in the course of the run ; and he 
 rarely neglects the opportunity of seeking for 
 safety by joining the herd, if he has the good 
 fortune to be able to do so.' 3 
 
 After two years of mourning, the spirit of 
 the country again revived, when, in 1827, the 
 late Sir Arthur Chichester, of Youlstone, 
 brought a pack of hounds into the field, and 
 once more restored the " antient sport," no less 
 to Russell's delight than to that of the whole 
 country. 
 
 On Sir Arthur's resignation in 1833, the 
 " sport of kings " again fell into abeyance, and 
 but for the exertion of Mr. Colly ns would 
 probably then have disappeared for ever. He, 
 however, established a committee, of which 
 Russell, who lived fifty miles from Dulverton, 
 was not a member, although doing all in his 
 power to promote the object it had in view ; 
 and under its management the country was 
 hunted from 1837 to 1842. 
 
 The Hon. Newton Fellowes then came 
 
THE RE V. JOHN R US SELL. 3 1 7 
 
 forward and gave most efficient aid " in the 
 hour of need ;" the hounds being under his able 
 management till 1847, when the present Sir 
 Arthur Chichester became the master for one 
 season only. 
 
 In 1849 Mr. Theobald, and after him Mr. 
 George Luxton, of Winkleigh, took the helm 
 for a season each ; when Captain West suc- 
 ceeded to that honourable post, and was followed 
 by Mr, Tom Carew, of Collipriest, with John 
 Beale for his huntsman ; he, however, resigned 
 the command in 1853, to the general regret 
 of all classes. Captain West then came for- 
 ward a second time, but only to stop a gap, 
 which, happily, was destined soon to be long 
 and most efficiently filled by Mr. Fenwick- 
 Bisset, who, taking the command in 1855, 
 held it to the entire satisfaction of the whole 
 country to the year 1881, when he was 
 succeeded by Lord Ebrington the present 
 Master. 
 
 Nor will the work done by Mr. S. H. 
 Warren, who for so many years and with 
 so much tact acted as honorary secretary to 
 the Devon and Somerset Hunt, be readily 
 forgotten ; for long, able, and gratuitous were 
 
318 MEMOIR OF 
 
 the services of that gentleman in behalf of the 
 noble sport peculiar to that country. 
 
 Russell could not speak too highly in praise 
 either of the management or of the sport Mr. 
 Bisset had shown ; the latter he considered 
 equal to anything he remembered in the palmy 
 days of old, when " the halls of Castle Hill rang 
 merrily with the wassail of the hunters''; and 
 as to the former, he would say that no man ever 
 handled the farmers with more consummate 
 tact, nor did more to establish the noble sport 
 on a sure and permanent footing, than he 
 had done. 
 
 Mr. Collyns, to whose able and graphic 
 work on " The Chase of the Wild Red Deer " 
 the writer is beholden for so much information 
 on that subject, thus alludes to Mr. Bisset : 
 " The sport has now the countenance and 
 support of the landlords and the enthusiastic 
 good wishes of the farmers. Mr. Bisset knows 
 how to take the command of a pack and of a 
 country ; and hunting as he does on the most 
 improved principles, observing the rules from 
 which in days of yore no sportsman ever 
 deviated, having his deer carefully harboured, 
 drawing with tufters and not with the pack, and 
 
THE RE V. JOHN R US SELL. 3 1 9 
 
 so avoiding the danger of destroying deer out 
 of season or unwarrantable, I have no doubt he 
 will find the owners of coverts continue to rally 
 round him as they have done ; and that, if it 
 should be our good fortune to keep him amongst 
 us, he will again re-establish the sport and place 
 it on such a footing as to make it vie with that 
 which our forefathers witnessed, and the history 
 of which they recounted and handed down to 
 their sons and sons' sons with pride. Woe 
 betide the stag which the present pack pursue ! 
 Well may he tremble when he hears the twang 
 of John Babbage's horn, and catches the sound 
 of his able coadjutor's, Arthur Heal's, shrill 
 1 hark together,' as he cheers the eager hounds 
 on their quarry. Not all his wiles, his fleetness, 
 or his cunning, can save him from his well- 
 trained foes." 
 
 It is to Russell, no doubt, and probably 
 to Mr. Jekyll, the rector of Hawkridge, that 
 Mr. Collyns alludes, when, observing that the 
 recreation of the chase is deemed incompatible 
 with the duties of clerical life, he thus adds : 
 " For myself, I will say that, without wishing 
 to see the dignitaries of the Church again 
 maintaining their kennels of hounds, I should 
 
320 MEMOIR OF 
 
 feel regret if I were to miss from the field the 
 familiar faces of some of those members of the 
 clergy who now join in the sport of our country; 
 and whose presence is always welcomed at the 
 covert side." 
 
 Without records of any kind to refer to, 
 beyond those dependent on memory and oral 
 tradition alone, the attempt to give anything 
 like a detailed account of Russell's sport and 
 doings with the staghounds would be at once 
 a difficult and most thankless task. Local 
 descriptions, however wild and grand the 
 scenery may be, don't suit the general reader, 
 and are too often followed with difficulty, even 
 by those to whom the landmarks of the country 
 are well known. 
 
 The " sport of kings,'' however, has formed 
 so considerable a portion of Russell's hunting 
 life, that to make no reference to it in this 
 memoir would be an omission which not only 
 modern Actaeons, but many a fair follower of 
 the buskinecl queen, would look upon as unpar- 
 donable. For has not he, from time beyond 
 their ken, been one of the prominent features, 
 and to many the guiding star, of that gay and 
 brilliant meeting which, year after year, inau- 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 321 
 
 gurates the opening-day on Cloutsham Ball ? 
 Nay, with his knowledge of the forest, extend- 
 ing as it does to every bridle-path and sheep- 
 track ; to every ford, clam, and safe crossing- 
 place during the stormiest state of the moorland 
 floods ; to the readiest inlets and outlets of 
 every woodland combe from the Quantock 
 Hills to Mole's Chamber has he not scores 
 of times picked up the waifs and strays of the 
 hunting-field ; and then, as "guide, philosopher, 
 and friend," led them in their sorest need into 
 safer and happier grounds ? 
 
 Yes ! countless are the heroes and fair 
 women, too, who have been thrown out in that 
 wild chase, and who, but for his pilotage, know- 
 ledge of the moor, and, above all, the experience 
 he has had in the running and wiles of the 
 hunted deer, would never have seen a hound 
 again. It is not very long since that a gentle- 
 man, better versed in the intricate ways of the 
 law than in those of Exmoor, came down for a 
 month's hunting to Porlock. The first meet 
 was at Brendon Barton ; and the harbourer 
 having reported a " warrantable deer " in Par- 
 sonage Wood, the tufters were trotted off to 
 that point, and no sooner laid on than up 
 
 21 
 
322 MEMOIR OF 
 
 jumped the grand beast, breaking away in view 
 by Fairleigh, and putting his head straight for 
 the distant Chains of Exmoor. 
 
 The rouse was magnificent, and the hounds 
 being clapped on at once, away they went at best 
 pace for the wild waste on Exehead ; crossing 
 the brook above Cornham, they raced thence up 
 to Acland's Allotment and Fivebarrows, through 
 the deep ground, of which none but the stoutest 
 horses and most experienced men could now 
 hold their own and live with the hounds. 
 Among these, however, was our friend the 
 barrister, well mounted and well forward on a 
 thoroughbred grey, but riding a little wide of 
 the pack and following a well-known member 
 of the hunt, on whom he had been told to keep 
 his eye. Never was a field in greater discom- 
 fiture : some scattered for miles over the dusky 
 moor, some floundering in the bog like flies in 
 treacle ; others brought to a dead standstill, as 
 the chase swept on to Yard Down, Bray, Challa- 
 combe, Showlesborough Castle, and thence to 
 Woodbarrow, where the gallant grey and his 
 rider, having left their pilot miles behind, 
 came to grief, and bid fair, in the absence of 
 all human aid, to pass the night amid the 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 323 
 
 swamps and jack-o'-lanterns of that solitary 
 waste. 
 
 The man had, of course, quitted his saddle ; 
 and, with bridle in hand, was doing his utmost 
 to help the horse forward, as he now struggled 
 hock-deep through the spongy soil. With a 
 few more plunges in the same direction, the 
 brave beast must have come to its girths in 
 another half-minute ; when a ringing shout, 
 such as no one but Russell could have given, 
 reached the rider's ears : " Back, for your life, 
 man ; back, I tell you ! " 
 
 Instantly obeying the mandate, he managed 
 with a mighty effort to get the grey's head 
 fairly round ; then with a few frantic plunges, 
 the gallant animal stood once more on sound 
 ground. 
 
 "Now then," said Russell, who had lingered 
 near him to see if he needed further help, 
 " the deer's going to Woolhanger ; and if you 
 stick to me, we shall probably catch them 
 again." 
 
 He did stick to him, like his shadow, and 
 caught the pack in the covers below ; when the 
 deer, hard pressed, broke away and took to 
 sea ; but being blanched by a boat, soon landed 
 
324 MEMOIR OF 
 
 again, and after a short chevy was finally run 
 into amid the surf and shingle of that loud- 
 sounding shore. 
 
 The habits of a deer by night and at early 
 dawn were perhaps never better understood by 
 any man than by Jem Blackmore, harbourer to 
 the staghounds for so many years ; but it may 
 well be doubted, if by day even he knew half as 
 much as Russell did about the shifts and run- 
 ning of a deer when once roused and away. 
 The former, indeed, had details to study, the 
 perfect knowledge of which could only be 
 acquired by long experience and the keenest 
 and nicest observation. With the perceptive 
 faculty of a prairie-hunter, he had to note care- 
 fully every trace, slot, or sign of the wary game, 
 whose haunts and ambush it was his object to 
 discover. How difficult the lesson, but how 
 well it may be learned, may be gathered from 
 the picture of a harbourer so artistically painted 
 by Mr. Whyte-Melville in " Katerfelto." "The 
 ground," he writes, " must indeed be hard, and 
 the 'slot,' or print of the animal's feet, many 
 hours old to baffle Red Rube, who, stooping to 
 the line like a bloodhound, reads off, as from a 
 book, the size, sex, weight, and age of the pass- 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 325 
 
 ing deer, the pace at which it was travelling, 
 its distance ahead, and the probability of its 
 affording a run." 
 
 Russell's pursuit, however, of the noble 
 animal commenced only with the uncoupling of 
 the tufters the point at which the other has 
 brought his labours to a close. But from that 
 moment, although simply a looker-on like the 
 rest of the field, yet owing to his intimate 
 knowledge of the dodges which, before break- 
 ing cover, an old deer will adopt to save his 
 haunches, many a needless sacrifice has been 
 averted and many a glorious run obtained. 
 An old stag, for instance, rarely if ever goes to 
 lair, without having a brocket, or young stag, 
 within reach of him, which, when he is pressed 
 by hounds, he turns out and instantly lies down 
 in his bed a sight once witnessed by Russell 
 himself. The substitute then, till the trick is 
 discovered, is compelled to do penance for his 
 noble friend, the monarch of the glen. Thus 
 the changes, which are constantly occurring 
 before the right animal can be driven to face 
 the open and exhibit his beam and branches 
 to the gaze of a crowd, are so frequent 
 and so puzzling that, in the absence of a 
 
326 MEMOIR OF 
 
 view, it often requires judgment of the most 
 acute order to discriminate whether the tufters 
 are flinging their tongues so merrily on the 
 right or the wrong game ; on a hind, a brocket, 
 or a warrantable deer. 
 
 Not once, nor twice, but a hundred times 
 and more, has Russell done good service in 
 that way. To him again, beyond all doubt, 
 does Mr. Collyns allude when he describes the 
 tufters at work, and the " hark back," to which 
 so frequently they are compelled to submit. 
 " Shiner/' he says, " is close upon them (two 
 hinds and a calf), and the rest of the tufters 
 following him. A little rating and a few cracks 
 of the whip, and their heads are up : they 
 know that they are not on the ' real animal ;' 
 and as soon as Sam's horn summons them, 
 back they go, and resume their labour. Again 
 they open, and again we are on the alert. The 
 cry increases ; they run merrily, and we are 
 high in hope. 'Ware fox!' says a M.F.H., 
 the best sportsman in the west, as he views 
 Charley slinking along towards the gap on the 
 hedgerow. Then, with his stentorian voice, he 
 calls out to Sam, ' Your hounds are on a fox, 
 Sam.' Sam does not hear, but rides up within 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 327 
 
 a hundred yards of us. * What, sir ? ' ' Your 
 hounds are on a fox, Sam,' repeats the M.F.H. 
 1 Think not, sir,' says Sam ; * my hounds won't 
 hunt fox ! ' 'I tell you that they are on a fox, 
 Sam ; call them off,' says the foxhunter. Sam 
 looks vicious, but he obeys, saying, in a voice 
 which could be heard by the Master of Fox- 
 hounds, but certainly not by the tufters, ' Get 
 away, hounds, get away ; ain't you ashamed of 
 hunting of a stinking little warmint, not half 
 the size of yourselves ? Get away ! ' Sam 
 still maintains his creed that his tufters were 
 not on the fox, and two minutes afterwards a 
 yell announced that a different sort of animal 
 was afoot. Another tally ; Tom Webber's 
 voice ; a guarantee that it is the right thing, 
 for the good yeoman is the best and truest 
 stag-hunter that ever cheered a hound. Every 
 one is on the alert ; we ride forward, and pre- 
 sently, in the distance, view, not a stag, alas ! 
 but a hind breaking towards the moor. ' How 
 is this, Tom ? You were wrong for once.' 
 ' No, sir; not I. I'll swear it was a stag, and 
 a good one, but you see he has pushed up the 
 hind and gone down, and we must have him 
 up again.' So the tufters are stopped again, 
 
328 MEMOIR OF 
 
 and sent back on heel ; and by-and-by that 
 unmistakable 'yell' which announces a view 
 is heard, and this time the antlered monarch 
 reveals himself to the whole of the assembled 
 multitude." 
 
 Then again, on the water, \\hich almost 
 invariably is the last refuge of a deer in dis- 
 tress, the countless wiles he will adopt to elude 
 his pursuers have been so often witnessed by 
 Russell, that it is no figure of speech to say he 
 was familiar with them all. More than sixty 
 years of experience, the keenest observation, 
 and a thorough acquaintance with the habits 
 of the animal, at least in chase, gave him 
 a power which, when appealed to, generally 
 proved more than a match for the craftiest 
 stratagem practised by a deer. 
 
 In early days, when Russell kept his otter- 
 hounds at South Molton, and earned the grati- 
 tude of all fly-fishermen in that country by 
 ridding the rivers of five-and-thirty otters in a 
 couple of seasons, he must have learned many 
 a useful lesson in studying the watery ways of 
 those mysterious animals. The subtlety of their 
 habits, when closely pressed by hounds, must 
 have shown him how marvellous is the power 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 329 
 
 of instinct to elude pursuit, if life be at stake, 
 and water at hand that almost natural element 
 to which, for refuge, they are wont to fly. 
 
 It was a rare apprenticeship for him, that 
 time with the otter-hounds ; every kill develop- 
 ing fresh dodges, and qualifying him in after 
 years to solve those most puzzling of all prob- 
 lems in the Art of Venerie the wiles of a deer 
 when he comes to "soil." It is a fact known 
 to all followers of that noble sport, that, short 
 of diving, a deer will take as much advantage 
 of water as an otter does ; wading and swim- 
 ming for a mile or two, sinking himself to his 
 nostrils, with the topmost tine of his antlers 
 effectually submerged, and often quitting the 
 stream at one point to return to it at another. 
 ' : It not unfrequently happens/ 1 says Mr. Col- 
 lyns, " that the cunning animal has merely 
 ' soiled ! when he entered the stream and then 
 backed it on his foil, and laid fast in the covert." 
 
 Mr. Why te- Melville, too, in " Katerfelto," 
 describes the famous harbourer, Red Rube, as 
 being utterly perplexed by what a deer may do 
 when forced to its last move at the end of a 
 chase : " Who shall say that all this calculation, 
 this strategy, this reflection, is so far below 
 
330 MEMOIR OF 
 
 reason to be called instinct ? Even Red Rube, 
 many a mile behind on his pony, taxing his 
 resources of intellect and cunning, backed by 
 the observation of fifty years, that he may 
 arrive somehow at the finish in time to hear the 
 1 bay,' confesses he is but a fool when his wits 
 are pitted against those of a deer driven to its 
 last shifts." 
 
 But however marvellous may be the shifts 
 of a deer to save its own life, the animal is 
 equally adroit in saving that of its young. " I 
 have heard Russell relate," says an old friend, 
 " that on one occasion he witnessed a curious 
 manoeuvre on the part of a hind, which, with 
 true maternal care, successfully managed to 
 conceal and protect her calf, when pursued 
 by hounds. But let him tell his own tale. 
 ' We had been driving,' said he, ' for some 
 time in cover what all supposed to be a bar- 
 ren hind ; when, just in front of me, at the 
 head of the combe, out came a hind and her 
 little calf breaking away together over the open 
 moor. After travelling for some distance side 
 by side, I observed their pace slacken, as the 
 young one appeared to be flagging and unable 
 to hold on with her dam. The hounds were 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 331 
 
 now gaining rapidly on them, when I said to 
 Stucley Lucas, " They'll kill that poor calf to 
 a certainty." " No, they won't," he replied ; 
 ''she'll kick it down." In another instant, on 
 passing over some furzy ground, I distinctly 
 saw the hind give the calf a sharp kick with her 
 heel, and down went the little one as if she 
 were shot with a gun. It was the signal for 
 her to keep close a signal no sooner given 
 than at once instinctively obeyed. There she 
 lay, crouched up like a hare in her form ; while 
 the hounds, pressing on and keeping the hind 
 in view, swept over the spot without indicating 
 the slightest suspicion of the trick they had 
 been so artfully played. We ran that hind 
 over the moor for twenty miles, by North Mol- 
 ton to Nadrid Ford, where Tout, the huntsman, 
 and myself being the only two men up, he 
 turned and said, " Mr. Russell, what had we 
 better do ; we are close to Brembridge Wood ; 
 hadn't we better stop them ? " " Certainly," I 
 replied, " stop them at once ; for if you get 
 them in there, every hound will have his deer, 
 and you'll never get them out again. Go back on 
 the same line, and you'll pick up the stragglers." 
 " ' This happened on a Tuesday, very early 
 
332 MEMOIR OF 
 
 in the season, and before the regular hunting 
 had commenced. Two days afterwards, on the 
 way to Porlock, I was hailed by a turf-cutter, 
 who said, " The hind you hunted on Tuesday 
 last has only just gone back ; not an hour ago." 
 " How do you know it is the same hind ? " I 
 inquired, doubtingly. " Because, sir, she was 
 a light-coloured one, and had a very big udder." 
 The next day (Friday), the hounds were no 
 sooner thiown into cover than, to our utter sur- 
 prise, out came the same hind and calf again. 
 The latter quickly disappeared, but the former 
 took precisely the same line over the moor 
 which she had taken on the previous Tuesday, 
 gave us a glorious run, and at length fairly beat 
 us by gaining Brembridge Wood and joining 
 the herd ; and I doubt not,' Russell added, 
 ' that in a day or two afterwards the loving pair 
 were together again/ " 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 333 
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 Russell and His Friend ^ the Rev. A. F. Luttrell, of Quant ocks- 
 head The Danger of Handling a Stag at Bay Man and 
 Hound Injured, and both Saved by Russell Ladies to the 
 Front over Exmooi Mrs. Cholmondeley's Perilous Fall. 
 
 " He knows the best line for each cover, 
 He knows where to stand for a start, 
 And long may he live to ride over 
 The country he loves in his heart." 
 
 EGERTON-WAR BURTON. 
 
 VALUING the companionship of Russell not less 
 than his long and untiring devotion to the sport, 
 Mr. Fenwick-Bisset, the well-known Master of 
 the Devon and Somerset Staghounds, sent him, 
 in April, 1877, a couple of stags' heads, with the 
 following letter : 
 
 " I have sent you two heads to-day, one 
 taken in Sheardown Water on the 6th of 
 October last, the other that of a deer which, 
 you may remember, stole away from Hawk- 
 combe, and we hunted up to, and fresh found in 
 Badgeworthy Wood, ran him back and killed 
 
334 MEMOIR OF 
 
 him in Avon Pool, below Bossington. They 
 are not very big heads, but not the less memor- 
 able on that account. 
 
 " I was greatly struck by your exuberant 
 spirits in the hunting-field ; much more like a 
 schoolboy than a man of eighty. May you live 
 to see many more such runs as these afforded ; 
 and when you can no longer see them, may you 
 talk them over, like your rare old friend, Alic 
 Luttrell." 
 
 The following communication from a lady, a 
 near relative of Mr. Luttrell's, is so interesting 
 that, with her kind permission, it may well find 
 a place in this memoir : 
 
 "On the 28th December, 1876, Mr. Russell 
 was on a visit to his old college friend, the Rev. 
 A. F. Luttrell, of East Quantockshead, then in 
 his eighty-third year ; and on the following day 
 (after going on the Quantock Hills on foot, to 
 look for the hounds of Mr. Luttrell, of Dunster, 
 who was hunting near) he (Russell) went on to 
 St. Audries, the seat of Sir Alexander Acland 
 Hood, to dine and sleep, and to be present at 
 the tenants' ball on that evening, 29th. Dur- 
 ing dinner he mentioned as a curious coinci- 
 dence that, on looking over some family papers, 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 335 
 
 he found that in the Christmas week of 1776, 
 his father had made a journey on horseback 
 from Meath, near Hatherleigh, to Dunster, to 
 pass a few days at the Castle, with his old 
 friend and schoolfellow Mr. Luttrell, the then 
 ' Squire ' of Dunster ; and now, in the Christ- 
 mas week of 1876, their two sons were pass- 
 ing some days together, both over fourscore 
 years, and the next generation only, though a 
 hundred years had passed since that visit of their 
 fathers. Mr. Russell was then sitting at table 
 with several of the grandchildren and great- 
 grandchildren of his father's host and friend ; 
 among them, the present possessor of the 
 Castle, a grandson, and his eldest son, who had 
 attained his majority six months before, when 
 Mr. Russell had been one of the many old 
 friends assembled at Dunster on that joyous 
 occasion. 
 
 "At the tenants' ball the same night, Mr. 
 Russell was among the most active dancers, 
 joining in quadrilles, lancers, and country dances 
 with the prettiest girls in the room (all delighted 
 to have him for a partner), and greeting all his 
 old friends in his hearty manner. He retired 
 to bed at three a.m., regretting the necessity of 
 
336 MEMOIR OF 
 
 leaving the festive scene before Sir Roger de 
 Coverley began ; but he had to start at eight 
 a.m., on a journey of over forty miles, as, he 
 said, ' Lord Portsmouth's hounds were to meet 
 near his place in Devonshire, and he had 
 promised his lordship to be back soon after 
 twelve o'clock to show him his second fox' 
 which he did. The previous Monday had been 
 his eighty-first birthday." 
 
 Mr. Stucley Lucas, the present owner of 
 Baron's Down, whose father succeeded the late 
 Earl Fortescue, in 1818, as Master of the Dul- 
 verton Staghounds, and from whose house, it 
 will be remembered, Russell saw his first stag 
 killed in 1814, has kindly favoured the writer 
 with the following letter : 
 
 "So long ago as I can remember and that 
 is not far from half a century down to the 
 present year, Russell has always stuck to the 
 staghounds with a consistency unequalled by 
 any living man ; no matter where they met, 
 how long they ran, nor where they finished at 
 the end of the day. Our entrance-hall, as you 
 know, is pretty well decorated with stags' heads, 
 trophies of the chase in my father's time, when 
 the woods and combes of Exmoor resounded 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 337 
 
 with the music of those grand old-fashioned 
 hounds, which he kept for six years. 
 
 " Well, it would charm your heart to hear 
 the fine old fellow when he drops in upon us, 
 as he now and then does, still throwing his 
 tongue with all the vigour and animation of 
 
 o , o 
 
 youth, and pointing out, as if it had happened 
 yesterday, how this deer or that had fought his 
 last fight to the bitter end ; how, with brow- 
 antler, piercing like a bayonet, another had 
 killed the bravest young hound in all the pack, 
 knocked over the huntsman, or old Joe the 
 whip, or perhaps Russell himself, and held his 
 own against all odds, till the death-stroke fell, 
 and his life-blood crimsoned the ground. 
 
 " Then he would tell of one, whose royal 
 crown of beam and branches proclaimed him 
 king of the forest a deer so savage that, when 
 he was brought to bay in a farmyard, no one 
 for some time dared to approach him. At 
 length, as he shifted his quarters closer to the 
 house, Russell was let out of a window, and with 
 the aid of a rope was able to secure the noble 
 beast and avert the danger that threatened the 
 hounds. 
 
 " I see in my father's stag-hunting note- 
 
 22 
 
338 MEMOIR OF 
 
 book," continues Mr. Lucas, "an instance re- 
 corded of Russell's indomitable pluck : the stag 
 had crossed the Taw, when, coming to the bank 
 of that turbulent stream, Russell without hesita- 
 tion dashed into it and swam to the opposite 
 shore ; while, of all the field, one man only was 
 bold enough to face the stream and follow the 
 hounds. 
 
 " Again, I myself witnessed an act of cour- 
 age on Russell's part which I can never forget. 
 We had driven our stag, after a long run, to the 
 foot of the Quantock Hills ; and there, with five 
 or six couple of hounds only, had brought him to 
 bay in a small stream, just deep enough to com- 
 pel them to swim, while he stood firm on his 
 legs. What was to be done, for there was no 
 one up but Russell and myself? The situa- 
 tion was a most critical one ; as, with lowered 
 beam and defiant air, the deer's charge appeared 
 to be imminent ; and then, some of the best 
 hounds would either have been killed on the 
 spot, or have had their hides seamed from 
 shoulder to stern. Russell jumped off his pony 
 (Fox by name, a wonderful little animal, which, 
 by-the-by, immediately ran away and gave me 
 no end of trouble to catch him), rushed in upon 
 
THE RE V. JOHN RUSSELL. 339 
 
 the deer, caught him by the horns and held him 
 till a third man came to his aid ; who, so far as 
 I can recollect, was poor old Tom Webber, 
 long since dead. Luckily for Russell, the deer 
 (a four-year old) was not a very savage one ; 
 so, while I held the horses, the two, after a 
 sharp tussle, managed to secure him. Several 
 of the field then made their appearance a little 
 too late, however, to witness the last act of the 
 play, the crowning scene of the day's sport. 
 
 " Russell and I started home soon after- 
 wards ; and, long as the distance was, reached 
 Baron's Down before nightfall. I need not tell 
 you that Russell has been out with the stag- 
 hounds, to the best of my belief, every day 
 during the past season (1877) ; that is to say, 
 when a stag was to be hunted ; for hinds he 
 doesn't care so much about. Let me add, that 
 he generally sees as much of the run as any one 
 out ; stays to the finish, and rides incredible 
 distances back to his home no trifling feat for 
 a man in the vigour of youth ; but for one of 
 his age a truly wonderful performance." 
 
 Even to one well accustomed to the sport 
 the business of collaring an old deer, when he 
 is " set up " by hounds, is a task that, to do it 
 
340 MEMOIR OF 
 
 safely, requires at times all the skill and adroit- 
 ness of a matador ; but to the inexperienced 
 hunter, no matter how quick, active, and strong 
 he may be, the stag, with those long, pointed 
 brow-antlers of his, which he is wont to use 
 with such terrible effect, is an awkward customer 
 to approach, when driven to his last resource 
 and confronting his foes on some vantage- 
 ground. 
 
 Many a narrow escape has Russell had, first 
 and last, at such times ; but fortune, aided by 
 his physical power and thorough acquaintance 
 with every mode of handling the animal in that 
 the final ceremony, carried him scathless through 
 numerous close and fierce encounters. 
 
 One day, during the mastership of Mr. 
 Stucley Lucas, who, it will be remembered, was 
 the last man to use the fine old-fashioned stag- 
 hounds of that country, he was more than once 
 exposed to imminent peril in saving a peasant, 
 partly intoxicated, from certain death. They 
 had found in Brembridge Wood, near Castle 
 Hill, a noble deer, strong and swift as the winds 
 of the moor, and bearing a grand head with 
 " three upon top " on each horn. After a sharp 
 burst of two and a half hours, they brought him 
 
THE RE V. JOHN R US SELL. 34 r 
 
 to bay in a small brook near Bratton Mill ; and 
 there, for a considerable time, he defended him- 
 self against all odds with so much vigour and 
 effect, that several of the most adventurous 
 hounds were more or less severely maimed in 
 the repeated and desperate charges he made 
 upon them. 
 
 And now the struggle had all but taken a 
 more serious turn : an old man, muddled with 
 cider, in spite of all warning, went up, and 
 attempted to caress the infuriated animal, ad- 
 dressing it thus : " Sober, now, sober ; don't 'ee 
 be scared, my pretty dear." On which the 
 deer, mistrusting his motive, made a fierce 
 lunge at him ; but missing a vital spot, drove 
 his brow-antler right through the old fellow's 
 hand ; and, then and there, would have cer- 
 tainly killed him but for Russell's immediate 
 help. He rushed in ; collared the deer by the 
 root of his near-side antler, dragged the man's 
 hand off the reeking tine, and then rolled over 
 and over with the deer into the bed of the 
 brook ; the animal forcing him under a foot- 
 bridge and kneeling upon him in the water. 
 
 At length the deer shifted his position, 
 releasing Russell and bringing his back to bear 
 
342 MEMOIR OF 
 
 against the wall of a thatched house, where, 
 like a Turk intrenched, he again stood his 
 ground with a lowered beam and defiant air. 
 But " the race is not to the swift, nor the battle 
 to the strong ; " for anon a farmer, called 
 Skinner, mounting the roof in his rear, with 
 rope in hand, gave token that the curtain was 
 about to fall and bring the last act to its tragic 
 end. 
 
 And here most touching was the spectacle 
 which the poor beast presented ; as, winding 
 the man on the roof behind him, he turned 
 round, stood on his hind legs against the side 
 of the house, and looked his enemy in the face ; 
 as if he would have said, in the extremity of 
 despair, " Ah ! that's foul play a cowardly trick 
 to win your game." 
 
 The noose then fell ; but his noble head 
 which may still be seen adorning the hall of 
 Baron's Down yet exists to tell the tale and 
 remind Mr. Lucas and his friends of the 
 perilous incidents which occasionally attend the 
 chase of the wild red deer. 
 
 Mr. Collyns, although he gives neither date 
 nor minute particulars, probably alludes to the 
 same event at Bratton Mill, where, he says, " I 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 343 
 
 remember seeing a deer, when ' set up ' by 
 hounds, thrust his brow -antler through the 
 hand of a man who attempted to secure him ; " 
 and then he adds : " On one occasion when I 
 was out, the late Sir Arthur Chichester, then 
 the Master of the Hounds, had a very narrow 
 escape from serious injury. We had brought 
 to bay an old stag, after a severe chase. The 
 deer posted himself on a high bank, from which 
 exalted position he set the hounds at defiance, 
 No rope was at hand, and whilst some of the 
 party were absent in quest of one, the master 
 rode up, and tried to dislodge the deer from his 
 vantage-ground with his whip. I saw the 
 animal gather himself for a charge, and had 
 just time to successfully warn Sir Arthur against 
 the danger he was in. He turned aside, and 
 in a moment the deer leapt from the bank, just 
 missed the horse's head, as it was being turned 
 away, and with tremendous force plunged his 
 antlers deep into the ground." 
 
 Short of death, one of the most frightful 
 injuries ever witnessed by Russell was inflicted 
 on a hound bred by Lord Portsmouth, and 
 called Falconer, in taking an old stag at Waters 
 Meet. Standing at bay above his knees, in the 
 
344 MEMOIR OF 
 
 East Lynn river, he drove his long brow-antler 
 up to its hilt in the hound's side; and then, in 
 withdrawing it, brought out that portion of the 
 interior known as " the apron " clinging to the 
 rough inequalities of the blood-stained horn. 
 Almost sickened by the sight, Russell put his 
 whip round the hound's neck, led him aside, 
 and having drawn out the apron as far as it 
 would come, he cut it off with a pair of scissors. 
 He then inquired if any gentleman or lady 
 present happened to have a needle and thread 
 about them ; on which, a gentleman immediately 
 came forward and produced a huswife well fur- 
 nished with the said articles. 
 
 " Any surgeon present," again inquired 
 Russell, " who will sew up the wound ? " 
 
 " I am one," responded another readily, 
 " and will do my best for the poor hound." 
 
 The operation having been quickly and well 
 performed, Falconer was then conveyed to 
 Simonsbath by a passing cart ; and, wonderful 
 to relate, at the end of a fortnight from that 
 day, was taken out again as a tufter by the 
 huntsman, John Babbage, who pleaded that he 
 absolutely needed his services, at the same time 
 pronouncing him to be " fit as a- fiddle " for that 
 
THE RE V. JOHN R US SELL. 345 
 
 or any other work. Nor did the hound ever 
 afterwards appear a pin the worse for the cruel 
 treatment he had so bravely survived. 
 
 The open and often stormy Severn-sea being 
 the last refuge of a deer when driven by hounds 
 to the rock-bound coast of his native wilds, it 
 has been Russell's lot, first and last, to witness 
 many a remarkable instance of buoyancy and 
 strength exhibited both by the stag and hind 
 in battling with the waves and struggling to 
 reach the opposite shore. On the 22nd of 
 October, 1876, Russell wrote: 
 
 " Letters just come in one from Mrs. 
 Kinglake, who, with her husband, son, and 
 daughters has been staying at Porlock for stag- 
 hunting since August to say that a stag we 
 ran to sea above Porlock Weir, a fortnight ago, 
 was drowned ; that the body was washed across 
 the Channel and picked up on the Welsh 
 coast. He didn't run three miles before he 
 went to sea, and I saw him battling with the 
 waves, now riding on their topmost crest, and 
 now lost in foam ; there was a very heavy sea 
 on, not half a minute before he went down. 
 William Deane was by my side, and said, ' He 
 has sunk.' My reply was, * If he has, 'tis a 
 
346 MEMOIR OF 
 
 very unusual circumstance ; for I have known 
 a deer out in the sea for four hours, after he 
 has stood two hours before the hounds ; and 
 have seen him come in again apparently quite 
 fresh.' He was drowned, however, if he did 
 not sink ; and so ends my tale." 
 
 The buoyancy of a deer in water, even 
 when dead, is not a little remarkable. His 
 body, though the lungs are no longer inflated 
 with air, will still float on the surface ; while 
 that of an otter, an animal commonly but falsely 
 supposed to be amphibious, will sink to the 
 bottom like a lump of lead. Mr. Collyns re- 
 lates that a stag " getting on Slippery Rock 
 fell over the cliffs and killed himself; fortu- 
 nately no hound followed him. The tide 
 was up, and he was carried out to sea for a 
 considerable distance ; and the boat sent out 
 to secure him arrived just in time to save 
 him from the hands of those on board a smack 
 going up Channel, who had all but reached 
 him." 
 
 Russell corroborated the fact : " Collyns' 
 version is quite a correct one. A deer will 
 float not ' swim ' for a long time after he is 
 dead, both in the sea and in a river. I have 
 
THE RE V. JOHN RUSSELL. 347 
 
 witnessed it often, and so have many other 
 Devonshire sportsmen ; but I have never seen 
 an otter float after he was dead." 
 
 Russell, in alluding to a deer that went to 
 sea for four hours and returned all the better 
 for his cruise, refers to a gallant old stag found 
 by Sir Arthur Chichester's hounds and driven 
 through Badgeworthy, over the moor to Lyn- 
 mouth. Six or eight couple of hounds were 
 pressing him sorely, when he managed by a 
 few mighty bounds to reach the pinnacle of 
 an isolated rock, from which, with a firm 
 footing for himself, he bid defiance to all his 
 foes. 
 
 A man, however, with a well-aimed pebble, 
 dislodged him at length from his perilous 
 perch ; and, as the deer bounded off like an 
 eagle into space, Russell shut his eyes, that he 
 might not see him, as he fully expected, dashed 
 to atoms. On looking again, however, to his 
 great delight he saw the animal striding away 
 towards the sea, where he remained for four 
 hours, standing boldly out for the opposite 
 coast. But he was taken and brought back 
 long before he reached it. 
 
 Another stag, less fortunate in his jump, 
 
34B MEMOIR OF 
 
 was so beset by men and hounds, near the 
 same romantic spot, that he bounded over a 
 road-wall, and fell hundreds of feet, down into 
 the rocky Lynn, every bone in his body being 
 smashed by the fall. 
 
 Again, Russell speaks of a deer which, after 
 a grand run from Badge worthy, went to sea 
 near Countisbury Church ; when a sloop bound 
 for Swansea fell in with him, the men of which 
 threw a rope over his antlers and carried him 
 captive into that port. Alas! a week after- 
 wards, the noble animal is said to have suffered 
 the ignominy of being " uncarted " and turned 
 out before a Welsh pack of hounds. 
 
 Nor was this act of piracy an exceptional 
 case. Russell, on another occasion, saw a hind 
 picked up by a fishing-smack in the face of all 
 the hunters, who, posted on the cliff above,' 
 shouted and signalled in vain to the daring 
 thieves. The animal was carried to Pill, sold 
 there, and turned into venison. 
 
 In the rough and imperfect sketch of Rus- 
 sell set forth in this memoir, his devotion to 
 the chase and its attendant mysteries has thus 
 far purposely formed its chief foreground ; but 
 there is another feature of his character which, 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 349 
 
 though not yet touched upon, is entitled to 
 equal prominence in the picture ; and that is, 
 his devotion to women and children. In a 
 spirited article, entitled, "A Day with the 
 Devon and Somerset Staghounds," contributed 
 to Bailys Magazine of September, 1874, the 
 writer (" E. K.") alludes very pleasantly to one 
 of the numerous instances in which Russell 
 has taken children under his especial tutelage, 
 and literally guided their first steps in the 
 hunting-field. It runs thus : 
 
 " Then comes the parson of the hunt what 
 west countryman does not know, without my 
 naming him, the best and keenest of sports- 
 men ? Up he comes, with a smile and a joke 
 for all. As he answers the numerous greetings 
 he receives, I catch his cheery acknowledg- 
 ments : * Very well, thank ye.' ' How's the 
 missis ? Long ride for an old fellow like me, 
 eh ? rode all the way from home this morning 
 a good thirty mile, and more.' ' Going to 
 ride all the way back too ? ' * Yes ; the old 
 horse looks well, don't he ? Doesn't change 
 much more than his master last my time, any- 
 how. Hullo ! that's your little girl ? Your 
 first day, my dear ? Then we must blood you ; 
 
350 MEMOIR OF 
 
 follow me, and you shall see the kill. Oh ! I'll 
 take care of her, never fear ! ' So I see the 
 plucky little girl made utterly happy she is to 
 
 be piloted over the moor by the Rev. , and 
 
 her joy is complete." 
 
 And as to women, it boots not where, how, 
 or when ; but his gallantry to them, in the field 
 or out of it, at home or abroad, has been 
 through life that of a Launcelot, anxious ever 
 to serve, succour, and defend them to the best 
 of his manly power. "God bless them all!" 
 he might say with Sterne ; " there is not a 
 man upon earth who loves them better than 
 I do." 
 
 Nor has the sentiment been ill-requited on 
 their part ; for no matter in what class of life 
 the maid or matron may be, if haply she have 
 seen much of his company, her eye will kindle 
 evermore with a look of sympathy and pleasant 
 memories at the bare mention of Russell's 
 name. 
 
 His readiness and ability to help ladies in 
 the stag-hunting field have been already alluded 
 to ; and from the eulogistic terms in which he 
 never failed to speak of a few as " elegant and 
 accomplished horsewomen," who, whatever the 
 
THE RE V. JOHN RUSSELL. 35 1 
 
 pace, were wont to take a brilliant lead and 
 look to no one for help, so long as their horses 
 could gallop and they could help themselves, 
 the writer is sanguine enough to hope that the 
 liberty will be condoned, if he venture to bracket 
 a very imperfect list of their names in company 
 with that of their devoted and staunchest 
 admirer. First and foremost, then, comes Miss 
 Kinglake, now the Hon. Mrs. T. Fitzwilliam ; 
 "one of the best," as Russell writes, " I ever 
 saw, from find to finish, on Exmoor." Then, 
 her promising young sister, Miss Beata King- 
 lake, Lady Lovelace, Mrs. Henry Dene, Mrs. 
 Pulsford Browne, of Kirk Bramwith, near 
 Doncaster "a lady who lived for many years 
 at East Anstey, near Dulverton, and hunted 
 with Lord Portsmouth's and the Staghounds 
 a very fine rider and one who went as straight 
 over a country as a bird on wing. She always 
 called me ' Uncle John ;' and once or twice in 
 a moor fog did me the honour to accept my 
 pilotage." 
 
 Then there was Miss Clara Jekyll, Miss 
 Hole, now Mrs. Wynch, Mrs. John Luttrell, 
 Miss Leslie, the three Miss Taylors, of Dul- 
 verton, Miss Julia Carwithen, now Mrs. Pyne- 
 
352 MEMOIR OF 
 
 Coffin, Miss Luttrell, Miss Widborne, Mrs. 
 Louis and Mrs. Russell Riccard, Mrs. James 
 Turner, Miss Vibart, Lady Lindsay, Mrs. 
 Proctor- Baker, Miss Constance Baxendale, and 
 Mrs. Lock- Roe, an elegant horsewoman, and 
 one of Russell's dearest friends. Then, last in 
 the list, but rarely so in the chase, come Mrs. 
 Granville Somerset and her sister Mrs. Chol- 
 mondeley, two ladies whom Russell describes 
 " as worthy of niches in the grandest temple 
 ever dedicated to the Forest Queen. " 
 
 Of a fall that befell Mrs. Cholmondeley, 
 where the two streams meet above Badge- 
 worthy once, as Mr. Blackmore tells us, the 
 stronghold of the Doones Russell always 
 spoke with a shudder. The hounds had found 
 in Hawkcombe ; and, in spite of a hurricane of 
 wind that was blowing at the time, had brought 
 their stag at a trimming pace over the moor 
 down to that old point, where so many have 
 " soiled," or sought refuge in the surrounding 
 combes. 
 
 Mrs. Cholmondeley, with Lord Cork near 
 her, was well in front, when Russell, at a short 
 distance behind them, beheld the lady riding 
 directly for the stream, and-, to his dismay, 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 353 
 
 attempting to cross it at a dangerous and im- 
 practicable spot. A high and almost perpen- 
 dicular boulder stood erect on the opposite 
 bank, bidding defiance to any steed short of 
 Pegasus, and presenting a barrier only to be 
 mounted by a scaling-ladder. Russell shouted 
 till he was hoarse, but in vain his warning was 
 drowned in the storm ; for, Mrs. Cholmondeley 
 putting her horse resolutely at it, the gallant 
 animal did his utmost ; but, failing to reach the 
 summit of the rock, fell heavily back into the 
 boiling Lynn, and so saved his own bones ; 
 while the lady was hurled to the ground with 
 an appalling thud. 
 
 Russell's blood curdled at the sight, but he 
 leapt from his saddle and stood by her side 
 in another instant. Anxiously awaiting the 
 recovery of her breath, and being fully persuaded 
 that some fracture of the limbs must have taken 
 place, Russell said, " Move your right arm ; now 
 the other : your right foot ; the other. Bravo ! 
 not a bone broken there. Now stand up." 
 
 The lady did so ; and, though much bruised, 
 in a short time was little the worse for her 
 perilous adventure. Lord Cork a hard man 
 in his day, and who must have seen more bad 
 
 23 
 
354 MEMOIR OF 
 
 falls than most men, if not during his Master- 
 ship of the Queen's Buckhounds, at least with 
 the Christchurch drag was so shocked by 
 the sight that, on finding the lady was well 
 attended to, he turned his horse's head and rode 
 home. 
 
 In the fifth room of the Borghese Palace, 
 at Rome, hangs an exquisite picture by 
 Domenichino ; the finest, perhaps, he ever 
 painted on a mythical subject ; it is entitled 
 "The Chase of Diana." The figure of the 
 goddess, who stands prominently forward, is 
 the very personification of beauty. She is 
 attended by a bevy of nymphs ; and to one, 
 whose superior skill as a huntress has just been 
 tested, the goddess is awarding the appropriate 
 prize of a bow and quiver. 
 
 But if, as of old in the valleys of Ida, the 
 Forest Queen were at present to hold High 
 Court in one of the ferny combes of Exmoor, 
 attended, of course, by the fair votaries men- 
 tioned above, her Majesty would be sorely 
 puzzled, so Russell thought, to decide on which 
 of them to bestow the first prize 
 
 " For, all so good, 'twere hard indeed to tell 
 Who figured first, or who should bear the bell." 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 355 
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 Visits Marham Hall and Sandringham Dances the Old Year 
 out and the New Year in with the Ptincess of Wales 
 Manly Traits in the Young Princes Sorrow at Home 
 His Clerical Life Tiverton Old Boys' 1 Meetings. 
 
 "Think you the chase unfits him for the Church ? 
 Attend him there, and you will find his tones 
 Such as become the place ; nay, you may search 
 Through many counties from cathedral thrones, 
 And lofty stalls where solemn prebends perch, 
 
 To parish aisles which are not cells of drones, 
 But echo the sweet sound of psalm and prayer, 
 And you will hear no voice more earnest there." 
 
 H. S. STOKES. 
 
 IN the early autumn of 1877, Frank Goodall, 
 the Queen's huntsman, accompanied by Mrs. 
 Goodall, paid him a visit at Tordown ; and 
 on Tuesday, the I4th of August, Russell, 
 who was to meet his guests at Cloutsham 
 Ball that being the first grand fixture 
 for the season, the opening day of the 
 Devon and Somerset Staghounds varied 
 
356 MEMOIR OF 
 
 his usual mode of going to cover by taking 
 a servant with him and driving thither in a 
 gig a conveyance and attendant expressly 
 meant for Mrs. Goodall's return to Tordown ; 
 while, at the same time, he led a spare horse to 
 carry Goodall during the chase. Although now 
 in the eighty-second year of his age, so unusual 
 a sight as Russell upon wheels attracted, of 
 course, universal attention among the large 
 field assembled at the meet ; some of whom 
 jumped at once to the conclusion, not an un 
 natural one too, that the long distance to cover 
 on horseback, just twenty-five miles, had at 
 length become too much even for him ; others, 
 with more humour, but with little ground for 
 their advice, prescribed a list-shoe, giving him 
 a broad hint that, if port wine were his liquor, 
 the sooner he put on a muzzle the better. 
 
 An old stag-hunting farmer, however, whose 
 feelings were really touched by the spectacle, 
 created no little amusement, as he said, pathe- 
 tically, " Zee ! there he go'th ; Passen Rissell 
 in a chaise ; never seed un afore off a horse's 
 back, never. But there, us must all come to't ; 
 yeu can't have tew forenoons to one day." 
 
 Grand and striking, indeed, must have been 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 357 
 
 the contrast to Frank Goodall's eye between 
 the deep, romantic combes of that country and 
 the gentle verdant slopes of Sunning Hill ; 
 between the wild, tumbling torrent of the Lynn 
 and the " silver-winding way'* of Father 
 Thames ; as, among water-lilies, weeping- 
 willows, and 
 
 " Meadows trim with daisies pied," 
 
 he glides gently and pensively seawards, lin- 
 gering still on his downward course, as if loth 
 to leave the peaceful and happy scene. Fair 
 and graceful, however, as the landscape is in 
 the region of Windsor, Frank Goodall must 
 have been more than a philosopher if a twinge 
 of envy did not seize him as he viewed the 
 sparkling brooks, the ferny combes, and the 
 open, heathery wastes of Exmoor, so attractively 
 romantic, and, above all, so suitable to the chase 
 of the wild red deer ; and on comparing, as 
 he must have done, these rough and almost 
 trackless hunting-grounds in the west with the 
 fair and cultivated enclosures enriching the 
 valley of the Thames, how ardently he must 
 have longed, on behalf of the latter, for a touch 
 of old Nature as he saw her then, in her russet 
 
358 MEMOIR OF 
 
 and untrimmed garb, in the solitude of the 
 glens, and the grand, sweeping moorlands, 
 " immeasurably spread " around him ! 
 
 But it was far from Russell's object that 
 his guest should moralize in such fashion ; he 
 brought him there to enjoy a good day's 
 hunting; but that, unfortunately, Mr. Bisset 
 and his hounds were, for a wonder, unable to 
 show him. So many deer were on foot in 
 Horner Wood, that, when at five p.m., 
 
 " The antlered monarch of the waste " 
 
 did at length vouchsafe to exhibit his royal 
 head to the public, he soon managed to beat 
 the pack by a change in the depths of Badge- 
 worthy. Consequently, the sport, on the whole, 
 proving indifferent, Goodall and he turned 
 homeward, but did not get back to Tordown 
 before the late hour of eleven at night. 
 
 On the following Friday, August i;th, 
 Russell again met the staghounds in Hawk- 
 combe Head ; and if, on the last occasion, he 
 had enjoyed but scant opportunity of satisfying 
 the " field," he must now have convinced them, 
 beyond all doubt, that his power of endurance 
 in the saddle was yet vigorous as ever ; and 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 359 
 
 that, notwithstanding the weight of years he 
 carried so bravely, to challenge him in a long 
 day's work on horseback, would still be " more 
 than the stoutest dare." 
 
 He had ridden nearly thirty miles to cover 
 over highways and byways such as MacAdam 
 would have blushed to own, remained with the 
 hounds all day, and then, from a yet farther dis- 
 tance, had returned to his own homestead ; 
 where, at half-past ten, he sat down to dinner 
 without a symptom of exhaustion, and then fed 
 heartily, as a man might be expected to feed 
 through the enclosure of whose lips no food 
 had passed since seven o'clock that morning. 
 
 Having folio wed him thus far in his fox-and- 
 stag-hunting career as closely as the scent would 
 serve and materials permit, it will be necessary 
 now to revert to a period somewhat previous 
 to that with which the writer has latterly been 
 dealing ; and although Russell himself might 
 have said that a for'rad cast is, as it ought to 
 be, one of the golden rules of a foxhunter, still, 
 exceptional cases do occur even in that go-ahead 
 school, when its non-observance becomes not 
 only admissible, but at times imperative. 
 
 Russell had found a fox on a certain occa- 
 
360 MEMOIR OF 
 
 sion somewhere in the neighbourhood of High 
 Bray, when, just before the hounds had killed 
 him, he was joined by one John Zeal, a man 
 who acted as factotum to Mr. T. Palmer 
 Acland, on whose business he was then going 
 to Bideford, Now John, as Russell well knew, 
 was an enthusiastic foxhunter, and chuckled 
 cheerily over his good luck in having fallen in 
 even with the tail-end of so pleasant an episode 
 during his solitary ride. 
 
 Seeing him so elated, Russell said, " You'd 
 better stop, John, and see me find another 
 fox." 
 
 The man hesitated a moment, as if weigh- 
 ing the urgency of his mission against the 
 prospect of sport duty in one scale and plea- 
 sure in the other. 
 
 " But, will you kill him, sir, if I stop ? " 
 inquired John, gradually yielding to the 
 stronger impulse. 
 
 " Oh, yes ! I'll kill him ; so, come along." 
 
 " But, will you promise to kill him ?" repeated 
 the man, still wavering ; " only say the word 
 and I know you'll do it." 
 
 "Then," said Russell, " I'll promise to kill 
 him." 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 361 
 
 That was enough ; up went the scale of 
 duty to the beam ; John instantly turned his 
 horse's head and followed the hounds. Russell 
 kept his word, had a fine run and killed his 
 fox ; but, alas ! John Zeal found himself, when 
 they finished, not only twenty long miles away 
 from Bideford, but on a horse utterly used up 
 and scarcely able to craw r l back to his own 
 stable. 
 
 The cause of his servant's detention became, 
 of course, known to Mr. Palmer Acland ; nor is 
 it at all unlikely that Russell's chance of pro- 
 motion to a better living was more or less un- 
 favourably affected by that circumstance. The 
 rectory of High Bray had fallen vacant, and 
 being in the gift of that gentleman, he was 
 asked by a mutual friend to give it to Russell. 
 
 " No ! " he said, somewhat curtly ; " not to 
 Russell ; I shall be hunted to death if I give 
 it to him." 
 
 Although living in times when cock-fighting 
 was regarded as no crime, but, on the contrary, 
 was upheld as a popular pastime, in which the 
 squirearchy of Devon played a conspicuous 
 part ; when friends of his own, gentlemen of 
 such standing in the county as the Hon. New- 
 
362 MEMOIR OF 
 
 ton Fellowes, Willoughby Stawell, Stucley 
 Lucas, and Dr. Troyte, of Huntsham, held 
 annual bouts for that purpose at their respec- 
 tive homes ; and when cocks of the choicest 
 blood, reared expressly for the pit, were put 
 out to walk, as hounds are at the present day, 
 Russell held aloof from the meetings, maintain- 
 ing that he saw no sport in the fierce and 
 savage exhibitions. 
 
 And with respect to the turf, perhaps no 
 man ever loved to see an honest struggle be- 
 tween two good horses better than Russell ; 
 but, on horse-racing in general, coupled as it is 
 inseparably with betting and other dark doings, 
 he has ever looked with a wary eye. In allud- 
 ing to it he would say, " Have a care, my old 
 friend ; that is a game in which the best horse 
 is not always the winner very different from 
 hunting, with twenty couple of hounds racing 
 over the moor ; there's no * pulling' nor ' roping ' 
 then ; every man does his best to get at them. 
 That's the racing to my mind nothing so 
 honest under the sun." 
 
 It would be travelling beyond the compass 
 and object of this memoir to tell of the various 
 agricultural meetings and hound-shows at which 
 
THE RE V. JOHN R US SELL. 363 
 
 Russell took a prominent part, as judge, during 
 the last twenty years. Suffice it to say, with 
 respect to the latter, that in Yorkshire he 
 acted twice in that capacity ; twice at Ply- 
 mouth ; once at the Crystal Palace, and lastly 
 in Dorsetshire, where he was invited in March, 
 1878, to judge the puppies of the Blackmoor 
 Vale Hunt. At that meeting what reminis- 
 cences of fifty years ago must have rolled back 
 on his memory ! what thoughts of his two 
 gifted friends, the Rev. Harry Farr Yeatman, 
 of Stock, and George Templer, of Stover the 
 latter his beau-ideal of a gentleman-huntsman, 
 and the former the well-beloved master and 
 founder of that hunt each a consummate judge 
 of all that pertained to hounds. He must have 
 wondered, too, if one drop of the old Stover 
 blood that of Guardsman or Pantaloon 
 could still be traced in the veins or looks of 
 those young beauties, over which he now lin- 
 gered with a fixed and loving eye. Nor could 
 that memorable ride to Bath on the Warmins- 
 ter poster have been forgotten at such a time ; 
 nay, every incident of the journey must have 
 recurred to him as freshly as on the dark night 
 when he first crossed that garran's back. 
 
364 MEMOIR OF 
 
 At an agricultural meeting held at Exeter 
 some years ago, Russell, while busily engaged 
 in inspecting the blood-stock of a neighbouring 
 squire, was told by an old friend that he had 
 brought a young cousin to the show-yard, who 
 was very anxious to be introduced to him. 
 " And let me tell you," said the friend, by way 
 of commendation, the young man being close 
 at his elbow, " that he is an ardent sportsman, 
 and has already broken his leg by a fall in 
 hunting." 
 
 " Then," said Russell, " he ought to be bred 
 from," giving him, as he did so, a hearty shake 
 by the hand. 
 
 When the Royal Agricultural Society of 
 England held its meeting at Plymouth in 1865, 
 Russell, by command of the Prince of Wales, 
 was invited by Admiral Sir Henry Keppel to 
 meet his Royal Highness at dinner, the Admi- 
 ralty House at Devonport being the rendezvous 
 for the distinguished party assembled on that 
 occasion. The banquet appears to have been 
 an unusually pleasant one ; nor is it at all extra- 
 ordinary that it should have been so, for, in 
 addition to the Prince's wonted affability and 
 love of hunting, the Admiral and his Flag- 
 
THE RE V. JOHN R US SELL. 365 
 
 Lieut, Lord Charles Beresford, besides being 
 the best of company, were both men after 
 Russell's own heart enthusiastic sportsmen, and 
 regular attendants on Mr. Trelawny's hounds. 
 
 In strolling through the show-yard on the 
 following day, Russell whispered to a friend 
 that, " The ship commanded by two such 
 officers must be a jolly-boat indeed, for they 
 were the jolliest set of fellows he had met for 
 many a day." 
 
 Sailors, when they take to hunting, pro- 
 verbially do it con amore, and certainly it may 
 be inferred that those gentlemen were no excep- 
 tions to that rule ; for when they left Plymouth 
 for other quarters, Mr. Trelawny could ill dis- 
 guise the regret he felt at losing two members 
 of his "field," whom he valued so much for 
 their companionable qualities, not only with 
 hounds, but at " table-board." 
 
 Russell, then, had fallen fairly on his legs 
 by dropping into so genial a groove ; and it is 
 quite certain that, if form and ceremony had 
 been the order of the day, instead of good- 
 fellowship, seasoned, it may be, here and there, 
 with a spice of horse-and-hound talk, he would 
 never have enjoyed himself as he did, nor so 
 
366 MEMOIR OF 
 
 cordially appreciated the honour done him by 
 that gracious invitation. 
 
 Not long afterwards, however, he was des- 
 tined to see something more of His Royal 
 Highness's society than, from his position in 
 life that of a rural, west country parson, only 
 known to fame within the limits of the hunting 
 world his homespun habits could have led 
 him to expect. 
 
 In the winter of 1873, by the kindness of 
 his friend, Mr. Harry Villebois, he was invited 
 to spend a week at Marham Hall, the ancient 
 seat of that gentleman's family, " to meet," as 
 the invitation expressed it, " the Prince of 
 Wales and a party of friends." It is doubtful, 
 however, if even so fair a promise of hospi- 
 tality, combined with the prospect of meeting 
 such goodly company, would alone have tempted 
 him to turn his back for six hunting days on 
 Lord Portsmouth's hounds, or Mr. Froude 
 Bellew's, or the " Stars of the West," and that, 
 too, in mid-season ; but, when Mr. Villebois 
 added, " and have a day or two with the West 
 Norfolk pack," he added a bait that was irresis- 
 tible, and Russell jumped at it as a trout would 
 at a May-fly. 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 367 
 
 It boots not here to tell how rapidly that 
 pleasant visit was brought to a close ; the hap- 
 piest moments have always the fleetest wings, 
 and are apt to take flight ere we can well 
 enjoy, or even realize, their presence. The 
 day before the party broke up, however, a most 
 agreeable surprise awaited Russell, ere his 
 steps were actually turned on his long journey 
 homewards. The Prince, coming up to him, 
 said, " How long are you going to stay here, 
 Mr. Russell ? " 
 
 " I must be at home on Saturday, sir, with- 
 out fail." 
 
 " Then," said the Prince, turning to Mr. 
 Villebois, " you had better bring him over to 
 our ball on Friday." 
 
 Accordingly, instead of returning on that 
 day to Devonshire, as he meant to have done, 
 Russell hunted with Mr. Villebois' hounds, 
 dined at Marham, and at night, accompanied 
 by his host, whisked off to the ball at Sandring- 
 ham. It was a late and lively affair, the 
 dancing being kept up with unflagging gaiety, 
 and Russell taking an active part in it, till four 
 in the morning, when " God Save the Queen " 
 sounded the signal to halt, and reminded the 
 
368 MEMOIR 
 
 guests of that salutary hint so well given in 
 Hudibras, that, 
 
 " Night is the Sabbath of mankind 
 To rest the body and the mind ; " 
 
 a hint which all, with the exception of Russell, 
 seemed quite ready to adopt forthwith ; but he, 
 at that chilly hour of morn, buttoning on his 
 top-coat the wool of which had been grown at 
 Eggesford, and, when manufactured into good 
 broadcloth, had been presented to him by Lady 
 Portsmouth started for Lynn ; and taking the 
 first train thence for London, he reached home 
 at a late hour that same night, " All the better," 
 as he told his friends the next day, " for change 
 of air and a pleasant outing." 
 
 That the Prince and Princess were not un- 
 favourably impressed with their west-country 
 guest, during his first flying visit, may be in- 
 ferred from the circumstance that, shortly before 
 his departure, the Prince sent Colonel Ellis to 
 invite him again to Sandringham for the ap- 
 proaching Christmas week : " And, as we hope 
 to hear him preach," said the Prince, " tell him 
 to put a sermon in his pocket before he leaves 
 home." 
 
 A story went the rounds of the London 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 369 
 
 clubs, that Russell, on accepting the Prince's 
 invitation, inquired of Colonel Ellis how he was 
 to get to Sandringham from the Wolferton 
 station ? 
 
 " The Prince will send his carriage for 
 you," replied the gallant equerry. 
 
 " Be good enough to write that down in my 
 pocket-book," said Russell, " that there may be 
 no mistake." 
 
 Colonel Ellis did so. 
 
 " Now," said Russell, " please to add your 
 initials." 
 
 The tale travelled into Devonshire, and 
 when it first reached Russell's ears he laughed 
 aloud, saying, " A very good story against me ; 
 if only it were true." 
 
 The annual tenants' ball being about to take 
 place on the last night of the year, a flutter of 
 excitement pervaded the neighbourhood for 
 many a mile round Sandringham, and expecta- 
 tion rose, not on tiptoe only, but to fever-heat, 
 in anticipation of that joyous event. It was 
 looked upon as the fete of the season, when the 
 Prince and Princess were wont to mingle merrily 
 in the dance, and delight their country guests 
 
 not less by the welcome they received than by 
 
 24 
 
370 MEMOIR OF 
 
 the simplicity, and almost homeliness of their 
 own manners. No wonder, too, if Russell felt 
 somewhat stirred by the coming event ; nor if, 
 remembering the seventy-eight winters of his 
 life, he might have wished for the magic caul- 
 dron of Medea to restore him again to the 
 vigour of youth, and bring back, at least for one 
 night, that " freshness of morning " which, with 
 " her clouds and her tears," the poet tells us is 
 
 " Worth evening's best light." 
 
 That would certainly have been his first 
 wish, had he foreseen the honour that awaited 
 him at the forthcoming ball. On that night, a 
 little before the clock struck twelve, and a few 
 minutes before the old year had passed away 
 for ever, Russell received an intimation that the 
 Princess was about to favour him with her hand, 
 and welcome the incoming year by taking him 
 for her partner. 
 
 It would be trespassing beyond the due 
 limits of this memoir to take more than a 
 passing glance at the mysteries of that festive 
 scene, the success of which, had the Muses 
 been present, Terpsichore herself would have 
 been charmed to witness. Russell, inspirited 
 
THE RE V. JOHN R USSELL. 37 1 
 
 by his happy lot, and forgetting all time, except 
 that of the music, stepped out like a four-year- 
 old ; and if, in the course of that brief enjoy- 
 ment, he had not been the object of many long- 
 ing, not to say envious, eyes, there must have 
 been Anchorites in that assembly with whom 
 he certainly would have had no sympathy. 
 
 It was whispered about by that little bird, 
 to which, from our earliest years, we have all 
 been indebted for so much authentic informa- 
 tion, that Russell, on hearing the tower clock 
 announce the birth of the new year, turned to 
 his fair partner and said, " Now I can say what 
 no man else can ever say again." 
 
 " And what may that be ? " inquired the 
 Princess, with an interested look. 
 
 "That I've had the honour of dancing out 
 the old year and dancing in the new (1874) 
 with your Royal Highness." 
 
 " Quite true," replied the Princess ; " no one 
 else can say that but yourself." 
 
 But Fame, that worst of all gossips, relates 
 of him on that occasion though he himself 
 stoutly repudiated the impeachment that, in 
 setting the Princess right as to some remark 
 she had made, he forgot for the moment whom 
 
372 MEMOIR OF 
 
 he was addressing, and said, " No, no, my dear ; 
 'tisn't so." But if, in truth, his tongue did so 
 slip, the pure Devonshire strain, in which he 
 was wont to use that familiar expression in 
 speaking to ladies, if it did not astonish, must 
 have amused her Royal Highness amazingly. 
 
 At dinner, on the first day of that week's 
 visit, Russell's country manners cropped out 
 somewhat conspicuously. He had been helped 
 to fish, and, wishing for more, had sent his 
 plate off for a second " helping," when the 
 Prince, observing the vacancy before him, asked 
 if he didn't like fish. 
 
 "Yes, sir," replied Russell, " I'm very fond 
 of fish. I've been helped once, and I've sent 
 my plate up a second time ; and now I remem- 
 ber, that's the very thing my wife charged me, 
 on leaving home, not to do," 
 
 The Prince laughed, but took care that every 
 day afterwards Russell should be helped a 
 second time to his favourite dish. 
 
 Under the conviction, in which he was not 
 far wrong, that his guest, like every orthodox 
 parson of the old type, would prefer a glass of 
 good " red port wine " to Bordeaux of the finest 
 vintage, or to Falernian, though " kept with a 
 
THE RE V. JOHN R US SELL. 373 
 
 hundred keys," the Prince called his attention 
 to a bottle of '20 port, of which, on being 
 invited to say how he liked it, he at once 
 expressed his unqualified approval. The next 
 day, however, a different and a somewhat 
 thinner port was put before him, and again the 
 Prince asked his opinion of that wine. 
 
 " Very good, sir," replied Russell ; "but not 
 quite so stout a wine as the port you gave me 
 yesterday." 
 
 The Prince at once, inferring that his guest 
 preferred the more generous wine, ordered the 
 bottle to be changed, and thenceforth Russell 
 enjoyed his glass of '20 port daily at the royal 
 table. He was, however, no gourmet, plain 
 food and sound home-grown cider having been 
 the chief diet on which he depended through 
 life ; and these, sweetened by mountain air and 
 strong exercise, appeared to agree with him 
 admirably. 
 
 After dinner, on the first day of his arrival 
 at Sandringham, a large party being present, 
 Russell became the subject of a harmless, but 
 very amusing, practical joke, which, as he said 
 himself, " for the life of him he could not 
 at first understand." Mr. Anthony Hamond's 
 
374 MEMOIR OF 
 
 foxhounds were appointed to meet in the neigh- 
 bourhood on the following day, and that gentle- 
 man being then present, a telegram was brought 
 in, which the Prince, amid the breathless silence 
 of his guests, opened and read aloud. It ran 
 thus : 
 
 " Bill George, Canine Castle, Kensal Green, 
 to Anthony Hamond, Esq., at Sandringham, 
 Wolferton. The Rev. John Russell having 
 disappointed me in not calling for a bagman as 
 he passed through London this afternoon, shall 
 send him down to-morrow by first train to 
 Wolferton. Hope he'll arrive fresh." 
 
 Such a telegram, as might be expected, 
 called forth a peal of merriment at Russell's 
 expense, but by whom it was concocted remains 
 a mystery to the present day. 
 
 At 'table, the carte-de-menu, exquisitely de- 
 signed, and very superior to anything Russell 
 had ever yet seen, attracted his especial admira- 
 tion. On the top appeared Sandringham House 
 and the date, with a border on one side filled in 
 with game, and all beautifully painted. " Isn't 
 that very pretty ? " said the Prince, observing 
 his guest's eye fascinated by the design. 
 " It was done by a bedridden girl, and you 
 
THE RE V. JOHN R US SELL. 37 5 
 
 must take that home to Mrs. Russell from 
 
 me." 
 
 On the Sunday, as requested to do so by 
 their Royal Highnesses, he preached at Sand- 
 ringham Church, the Rev. W. Lake Onslow, 
 the rector, placing his pulpit at his service, and 
 afterwards thanking him cordially for his able 
 and interesting discourse. And that the Prince 
 and Princess must have been equally impressed 
 by the clear enunciation and earnest manner of 
 the preacher there can be little doubt ; though, 
 on that point, if anything were said, history is 
 silent. 
 
 Perhaps no portion of his time was more 
 pleasantly spent than the quiet half-hour he 
 passed one morning with the Princess, who, 
 followed by her two eldest boys, then respec- 
 tively nine and eight years of age, invited him 
 to accompany them to the stables and inspect 
 the stud. " It was a delightful sight/' said 
 Russell, relating the circumstance to an old 
 friend, shortly afterwards, " to witness the utter 
 freedom of the youngsters as they tumbled and 
 plunged amongst the straw, and ever and anon 
 begged for a bit of chopped carrot, which the 
 Princess carried in a basket, in order to feed 
 
376 MEMOIR OF 
 
 some gentle favourite on which they had set 
 their hearts. A more natural sight I never 
 saw in my life ; and, mark my words, those two 
 boys will be as fond of horses as ever Castor 
 and Pollux were." 
 
 The agreeable party at Sandringham, on 
 that occasion, was brought to a close by the 
 departure of the Prince, who, taking Russell 
 with him as far as London, started off for St. 
 Petersburg, to attend the wedding of his 
 brother, H.R.H. the Duke of Edinburgh, an 
 event that took place on the 23rd January, 
 1874. 
 
 Miss L. T , a lady who had read a 
 
 letter of Russell's describing the pleasure of 
 his visit to Sandringham, wrote thus in allusion 
 to it : 
 
 " What a list of things he got through in 
 those ten days, and what a delightful picture 
 he gives of the family circle at S. ! I don't 
 wonder the P. and P. made much of their 
 guest, for all England may be proud of such a 
 man as Mr. Russell. I only wish there were 
 hundreds like him. ' Fox-hunting for ever ! ' 
 say I, if it helps to make such men." 
 
 In the autumn of that year, 1874, a heavy 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 377 
 
 sorrow awaited him the heaviest he had 
 known through life by the serious illness and 
 subsequent death of Mrs. Russell ; with whom, 
 had she lived but one year longer, he might 
 have celebrated his golden wedding-day. On 
 the 22nd of October, he thus wrote: "The 
 dear old missis is, I grieve to say, very ill ; 
 and I can't leave her for many hours together. 
 Still, she is cheerful when any one comes in, 
 and will, as usual, 'stir her stumps' to make 
 them comfortable. But that sort of exertion 
 does her no good ; and sometimes I am led to 
 believe she can't live through the day." 
 
 On the ist of January in the following year 
 the long-dreaded blow fell at last ; mercifully 
 releasing the patient sufferer, but overwhelming 
 Russell with unutterable grief. 
 
 Writing subsequently at intervals to an old 
 friend, sometime his curate, he alludes thus 
 painfully to his bereavement : " I am at home 
 again, though it no longer seems like home to 
 me, for there is a vacant chair in every room, 
 never again to be filled by her, the dear old 
 soul, to whom I was united forty- nine years 
 ago, come Sunday." Again : " If the sym- 
 pathy of friendship could soothe my grief, I 
 
378 MEMOIR OF 
 
 possess it to a very great extent ; for I have 
 received upwards of a hundred letters of com- 
 fort and condolence from friends, far and near. 
 Among them, one from the Prince of Wales, 
 most kindly and feelingly expressed." 
 
 On hearing from the friend, already so often 
 referred to, that he would like to see what the 
 Prince had said, Russell wrote as follows : 
 
 " MY DEAR OLD FRJEND, 
 
 " I have sent a copy of the Prince's 
 letter to Lady Westbury (nde Luttrell), who 
 will give it to you ; but, please remember, not 
 for publication, either before or after I 'sleep 
 the sleep that knows not breaking.' Love to 
 you all." 
 
 During a portion of that eventful year 
 (1875) ms ti me an d thoughts were much occu- 
 pied in preaching for charitable institutions, in 
 behalf of which he not only took an active 
 interest, but proved himself, as before men- 
 tioned, a most successful advocate. So truly, 
 indeed, were his services appreciated, that, at 
 the proposal of Earl Fortescue, he was consti- 
 tuted an honorary governor of the North Devon 
 Hospital. " I am worked to death," he wrote, 
 
THE RE V. JOHN R US SELL. 379 
 
 "at this season of the year (November) ; going 
 about from church to church on working days 
 as well as Sundays, preaching and begging for 
 the N. D. Infirmary and similar institutions, 
 and finding, when I come home, heaps of 
 letters to answer, but no one there to cheer me 
 in my labour alone ! alone ! " 
 
 In the same year, as if well aware that 
 occupation is one of the main secrets of life's 
 happiness, he accepted the office of chaplain to 
 the High Sheriff of Cornwall, Mr. George Wil- 
 liams, of Scorrier, who, in most complimentary 
 terms, offered him the appointment. Of course, 
 he rode to Bodmin, whence, in his epigram- 
 matic style, he thus described the duty he had 
 just performed : " Here I am, doing chaplain 
 to the High Sheriff of Cornwall, George Wil- 
 liams, M.F.H. ; and am just returned from 
 preaching before the Judges, Lush and Piggot, 
 both of whom thanked me for my ' discoose.' 
 I do like Cornwall and Cornish folk ; but must 
 be back in my old earth by the end of the 
 week. A day with the Duke will be a real 
 treat to me, when I come up to see you." 
 
 He alludes to the Duke of Beaufort, who, 
 when Russell paid the promised visit to his old 
 
380 MEMOIR OF 
 
 friend Davies, residing at Bath, very kindly 
 wrote to say he would send a horse for him 
 every morning to the cover side ; but, alas ! 
 six days of hard-hearted weather forbad it ; 
 frost and snow covered the ground ; and Rus- 
 sell, though rising each morn at seven to look 
 at a vane and hope for a thaw, went back 
 growling to bed. So, on that occasion, he 
 never once saw the Duke's hounds. 
 
 In all his letters, terse and brief as they 
 usually are, he displays to a remarkable degree 
 the power of making all who read them feel 
 and comprehend thoroughly what he himself 
 feels and what he would describe a power 
 said to have been possessed by Nelson beyond 
 any living man of his day. In writing to a 
 young lady, Miss B. F. D., on the 6th of 
 March, 1877, he says: "Alas! my head and 
 neck are now garnished with all the colours of 
 the rainbow. The good old horse I have so 
 long ridden, while galloping over a grass field, 
 fell on his head, and pitched me I don't know 
 where but certainly on my head for my hat 
 was ' britted in,' and I saw more stars in the 
 farmament than ever was a-put there. Ask 
 your old daddy to explain that to you." 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 381 
 
 Again, in the same year, he writes thus to 
 a brother sportsman, and claims his sympathy : 
 " Last Thursday Lord Portsmouth's hounds 
 met at Castle Hill ; and, while they were run- 
 ning, I suffered such agony in my teeth, that I 
 requested a medical gentleman present to rid 
 me of the chief offender. ' In lieu of a better 
 instrument, a bit of whipcord/ he said, ' would 
 serve the purpose ' ; and, verily, with that 
 hempen appliance out he lugged the supposed 
 culprit ; but, alas ! it proved to be a valuable 
 friend a tooth as sound as the day it was 
 'dropped.' You'll pity me, I know, when I 
 say this is not the first time I have suffered a 
 similar loss." 
 
 His habitual conversation, too, lacked no- 
 thing of the epigrammatic style so conspicuous 
 in his letters ; in it he went straight to the 
 mark ; and, if called upon to make a speech, 
 he invariably did so in a few words, always 
 pointed and often humorous. "If you have 
 anything to say, get up and say it, and then sit 
 down/' was the advice of the great Iron Duke ; 
 and that was precisely Russell's plan. 
 
 While dining with his old curate at Bath, 
 not long ago, with a party of gentlemen, most 
 
382 MEMOIR OF 
 
 of them west-country friends, one, a most agree- 
 able Cornishman, who was always on the move, 
 wandering about from place to place, and never 
 at home, complained to him that he did not feel 
 at all well, and that he thought he should go 
 away for change of air. 
 
 " Then," said Russell, " go home." 
 
 Had he. studied the rules of "Lacon" all 
 his life the pithiness of his advice could scarcely 
 have been more complete. 
 
 In 1 876 he again paid a visit to Sandringham; 
 but this time there was no " dancing the old 
 year out and the new year in." " The Prince's 
 time is so occupied," he wrote, " by a house full 
 of foreign grandees and other magnates, that I 
 wonder he can find time to pay, as he does, the 
 most minute attention to all." Among these 
 Russell found himself little at home, and of 
 course saw less of his royal hosts than on the 
 former happy occasion. He left, however, in 
 high spirits ; the Prince promising to come 
 down and enjoy a day or two with the Devon 
 and Somerset staghounds, and see the red deer 
 hunted in his native wilds. 
 
 But when the season for that sport had at 
 length arrived, and Nature was now clothing 
 
THE RE V. JOHN R US SELL. 383 
 
 the deep-wooded glens of the moor in varied 
 and glorious apparel, burnishing the golden 
 furze, the ruddy heather, and even the fern-clad 
 rocks of Watersmeet with the loveliest of 
 autumn hues ; and now, when the " stag of ten," 
 rudely wakened by the tufters from his long 
 and idle summer dream, is roused from his 
 leafy haunts and forced into view, displaying, to 
 the hunter's delight, his big haunches, stately 
 form, and magnificent head ; the bad news 
 reached Dunster Castle, where quarters had 
 been prepared for him, that the Prince was un- 
 able to leave home, owing to the serious illness 
 of one of his boys. So the project then fell 
 through, to the great disappointment of Russell 
 and every other stag-hunter, man and woman 
 from the fair maids of Taunton to the hardy 
 yeomen of the Western moors. 
 
 To enter minutely into the abstract question 
 of Russell's clerical life would scarcely be con- 
 sonant with the general tenor of this memoir ; 
 still, as all his life he represented a phase of 
 English character which, by the moderation of 
 his opinions, and the unconventional manliness 
 of his conduct, was a daily protest against the 
 forms of one party and the cant of another 
 
384 MEMOIR OF 
 
 against Stiggins on one side and " dear Mr. 
 Oriel " on the other a brief allusion to it can- 
 not be avoided. 
 
 To hold the line and maintain a steady 
 middle course amid the host of skirters, now 
 dividing and confounding their flocks, not less 
 by the motley variety of their views than by 
 the contempt they exhibit for the law of the 
 land, is unquestionably a feature of the highest 
 value in a clergyman's character at the present 
 time ; for never was the sectarian spirit more 
 rampant in the Church of England than it now 
 is within her pale ; and, unless a larger element 
 of secular ways and principles be infused into 
 the clerical mind, woe awaits her at no very 
 distant date. 
 
 The very union of Church and State de- 
 pends mainly on men who, like Russell, are 
 holding fast to English habits of thought and 
 the text of the Reformation, guarding against 
 divergence towards either extreme that of the 
 4 'self-willed'' formalist on one side, and that of the 
 shallow fanatic on the other. The narrow and ex- 
 clusive grooves in which the latter move, Russell 
 would have denounced as not only opposed to 
 St. Paul's view of being " all things to all men," 
 
THE RE V. JOHN RUSSELL. 385 
 
 and hence anti-Catholic, but absolutely incon- 
 sistent with the simple and comprehensive 
 religion of the New Testament. 
 
 " Our grand old Church," as a gentleman 
 writing to Russell remarks, " like other old 
 houses, will last a good many years yet, if it be 
 left in the hands of its original architects ; but 
 it will not bear an incursion of amateur builders. 
 ... If, then," he adds, " it has been the busi- 
 ness of your life to maintain and exhibit sound 
 and not ephemeral principles, and you have 
 helped to sustain the reputation and power of 
 the English character by simply cultivating the 
 gifts (which we in our blindness call tastes) that 
 God has given you, are you not ' a representa- 
 tive man ' ? But you will, I know, still sing 
 * Non nobis Domine,' and in your modesty con- 
 fess yourself to be an ' unprofitable servant.' ' 
 
 " Notwithstanding the iron arm and Dra- 
 conic rule of Dr, Richards, happy still are 
 Russell's recollections of his school days at 
 Tiverton ; and thither he went periodically to 
 promote the celebration of the "Old Boys' 
 Day ; " when he and all good Blundellians tes- 
 tified with gratitude to the beneficence of the 
 founder, and to the high scholastic advantages 
 
 25 
 
386 MEMOIR OF 
 
 conferred by that excellent institution. On one 
 occasion he told the once- dreaded Doctor 
 then, however, no longer in authority, but a 
 visitor like himself that "he was the only 
 man he was ever afraid of." 
 
 " Nonsense," said Richards, good-naturedly ; 
 " and was I so terrible ? " 
 
 "Yes," replied Russell, "you were. I've 
 set to with some of the hardest men in England, 
 and never found one who could hit like you." 
 
 At a meeting of the " Old Boys " at Tiver- 
 ton, Russell was once invited to preach the ser- 
 mon, which he accordingly did ; a local paper 
 observing that " the discourse was a very able 
 one." In addressing some remarks to the pre- 
 sent boys, he especially alluded to the brilliant 
 example of Dr. Temple, once a Tiverton 
 scholar, and now the bishop of the diocese a 
 beacon, he told them, they should never lose 
 sight of. 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 387 
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 
 CONCLUSION. 
 
 IN July, 1879, the valuable living of Black 
 Torrington was kindly offered to him by Lord 
 Poltimore, and with much perplexity was 
 at length accepted for reasons which the 
 following letter, written to Mr. Davies, will 
 best explain : 
 
 " Tell me, my dear old friend, what shall 
 I do about Black Torrington ? I cannot live 
 on ,220 a year, which is all I shall have after 
 I have paid a certain annuity for another three 
 or four years. Black Torrington is a clear 
 ^500 a year, and there is a good house ; but 
 then it is neither Tordown nor Exmoor, and 
 by the time I have settled in there, I shall 
 perhaps be called upon to leave it again for 
 Swymbridge Churchyard ! What shall I do ? 
 How can I leave my own people, with whom I 
 have lived in peace and happiness for half a 
 
388 MEMOIR OF 
 
 century ? It will be a bitter pill to swal- 
 low, if it must be taken ; but it will be my 
 poverty, and not my will, that will consent 
 to it." 
 
 Again, in October of the same year, he writes 
 from Tordown : 
 
 " The day of my departure from this my 
 happy home draweth nigh, and I am fretting 
 myself to death about leaving it. Old John 
 Squire of Accot told me on Friday that if I 
 went away from Swymbridge, it wouldn't be 
 long before I should be brought back again. 
 Cheering, very eh ? but possibly too true to 
 be pleasant." 
 
 The leave-taking was a sad business be- 
 tween him and his parishioners ; while their 
 sympathy and that of his friends farther afield, 
 including H.R.H. the Prince of Wales, was 
 manifested by a handsome testimonial, which, 
 amounting in value to nearly ^800, was pre- 
 sented to him by Earl Fortescue, on behalf of 
 all the subscribers. The ceremony took place 
 at the Duke of Bedford's mansion in Eaton 
 Square, kindly lent by His Grace on that 
 interesting occasion. 
 
 Lord Fortescue said, " He had much plea- 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 389 
 
 sure in performing the pleasing duty of making 
 the presentation ; but the occasion was to him 
 a sad one, owing to the removal of his old 
 friend from Swymbridge to another parish 
 fortunately, still in the county of Devon. They 
 would not therefore be losing him altogether. 
 The presentation was a mark of their hearty 
 regard, friendship, and respect for Mr. Russell, 
 as a man, a sportsman, and a clergyman." 
 His lordship then paid a high tribute to the 
 reverend gentleman " for his kindly work as a 
 clergyman in his late parish, and for his charity 
 and Christian love." 
 
 Russell, after papering and painting the old 
 rectory at Black Torrington, to which he had 
 now removed, commenced building a set of new 
 stables, at a heavy cost, and had just finished 
 the work, when a fire broke out in them, and 
 treated him to such a " house-warming " as he 
 had never before encountered. " I had only 
 just completed them," he wrote, " and at my 
 own expense, when in less than an hour and a 
 half they became a heap of ruins. There were 
 two horses, Simon and a valuable Irish mare, 
 in them, besides two terriers. Alas ! they are 
 all dead." 
 
390 MEMOIR OF 
 
 On Friday, the 22nd of August, 1879, he 
 was invited by Mr. Luttrell to meet the Prince 
 of Wales at Dunster Castle ; and on that day a 
 noble stag, roused in the depths of Hawkcombe 
 Head, led them a glorious chase over the 
 wildest region of Exmoor, the Prince, who was 
 well up at the finish, being greatly delighted 
 with his day's sport. 
 
 Then, in the same year, on Monday, the 
 3rd of November, that being the opening day 
 of the Quorn Hounds, we find him at Kirby 
 Gate, mounted by his friend, Mr. Pennell- 
 Elmhirst, to whom he was paying a long- 
 promised visit. 
 
 On Tuesday, the 4th, he hunted with the 
 Cottesmore at Tilton Gate, and that evening 
 Lord Carington, the Master, and Mr. George 
 Grey, the famous Northumberland sportsman 
 and rider, now Master of the Glendale, were 
 invited by Mr. Pennell-Elmhirst to meet him 
 at dinner. 
 
 Talking of foxhounds, Mr. Grey asked 
 Russell if he thought the foxhound was " a 
 distinct species of dog from the first." 
 
 " Did he, in fact, come out of the ark?" 
 explained Lord Carington. 
 
THE RE V. JOHN R US SELL. 39 1 
 
 "How could he?" returned Russell; " did 
 not a brace of foxes come out alive ? " 
 
 On Wednesday, the 5th, he joined the 
 Belvoir hounds at Croxton Park, hunting that 
 day upon wheels. 
 
 Thursday he devoted to travelling westward, 
 and reaching Bath that evening, he managed 
 to see the Duke of Beaufort's hounds find a 
 fox next morning near Cross Hands ; after 
 which meet he started for home, intending to 
 wind up the week by hunting with Lord Ports- 
 mouth's hounds the next day. 
 
 In 1 88 1, a month or so before the Ascot 
 week, Colonel J. Anstruther Thomson conceived 
 the happy idea of bringing together under his 
 own roof two kindred spirits, both old friends 
 of his own, but living widely apart and hitherto 
 personally unacquainted with each other. They 
 were the Rev. John Russell and Mr. John 
 Whyte-Melville, Master of the Fife Hounds in 
 the early part of this century, and father of the 
 late distinguished Author, whom the Patriarch 
 lived to mourn as his only son and 
 
 " Last scion of an antient Scottish line." 
 
 Mr. Whyte-Melville was 84, Russell in his 
 
392 MEMOIR OF 
 
 86th year, and so they numbered between them 
 1 70 years. Having regard to this fact Thomson, 
 whose drag was to convey them to and fro 
 from Slough to Ascot, deemed it advisable to 
 consult his two venerable guests as to the days 
 on which they would like to attend the races ; 
 thinking it just probable that going every day 
 might be a turn too much for them. But not a 
 bit of it ; Why te- Melville, who was first con- 
 sulted, asked how many days the races lasted. 
 
 " Four," replied Thomson. 
 
 " Then," said he, " I should like to go every 
 day." 
 
 The question being put to Russell, he said, 
 " I too should like to go every day ; but I have 
 an engagement to meet a curate on the 
 Thursday, and keep it I must." 
 
 The curate, however, did not turn up ; and 
 Russell knew it in time to take the box-seat 
 beside Thomson, and go down to Ascot on that 
 as on every other day. 
 
 Col. Anstruther Thomson declares that his 
 two veterans were the life and soul of the 
 party ; and doubts if a coach-load so cheery and 
 so congenial as his own could have been found 
 on Ascot Heath. 
 
THE RE V. JOHN R US SELL. 393 
 
 Again, in the autumn of that year (1881), 
 he hunted as usual with the Devon and Somerset 
 Staghounds. The meet on one occasion being 
 at Culbone Stables, they soon found in Pitcombe, 
 one of Lord Lovelace's covers ; but the hounds 
 dividing, the " field " followed the body of the 
 pack, while Russell with one other man stuck 
 to a couple of hounds, and with them brought 
 the stag to bay near Badgery Water. " I can 
 well remember seeing him," writes Mr. Nicholas 
 Snow, the able Master of the Stars of the 
 West, " as he crossed the moors from Culbone 
 with the leading hounds, and shall never forget 
 his ringing cheer as they broke from the river 
 to Badgery, and on to Brendon Common. 
 Several people passed the remark, * Look at 
 Russell leading across Badgery!'' In a little 
 more than three months from that date he 
 celebrated his 86th birthday, being still in fine 
 health and robust form. 
 
 In the following February (1882) Russell 
 again paid a visit to Sandringham, and was as 
 before charmed with the consideration and 
 kindness he met with from the Prince and 
 Princess of Wales. On parting they presented 
 him with a horse-shoe diamond scarf-pin, which 
 
394 MEMOIR OF 
 
 the Prince put into the scarf himself, saying, as 
 he did it, " There now, it looks quite clerical." 
 
 " But," said Russell, bowing to the royal pair, 
 "may I ask if it is given conjointly ?" 
 
 " Yes, of course, conjointly," replied the 
 Princess with a charming smile. 
 
 Again, in 1882, the staghounds saw him 
 booted and spurred at the cover-side, still 
 cheery and enjoying the sport ; but, as his 
 friends observed, much broken, and showing 
 manifest tokens of failing strength. With the 
 fall of the leaf, however, on the 1 5th of October, 
 he wrote as follows to his old friend at Bath : 
 " I am going to London on Tuesday morning 
 to marry Mr. Curzon, the Duchess of Beaufort's 
 nephew, to Miss Basset- Williams, of Pilton 
 House ; the ceremony is to take place in Curzon 
 Chapel, May Fair. When it is over I shall 
 turn my head homewards, and should like, if 
 you and the missus will have me, to break the 
 journey at 26, Circus, for one night only. But 
 I am more fit for bed than a railway carriage." 
 
 The wedding took place two days after, 
 but the knot was tied by other hands. On that 
 day, the I7th, a letter from his faithful house- 
 keeper, Mary Cocking, reached Bath instead of 
 
THE REV. JOHN RUSSELL. 395 
 
 Russell ; it ran thus : " I am grieved to say 
 my dear master is very unwell, and in bed since 
 Sunday. Three doctors are attending him, 
 and I fear they think him very, very ill." 
 
 The attack was a critical and a dangerous 
 one the beginning of the end, as his friends 
 rightly conjectured but such had been his 
 temperate habits and fine constitution that, aided 
 as he was by the assiduous and scientific atten- 
 tion of Dr. Linnington Ash, his medical man, 
 he was able in January, 1883, to leave home 
 and go for change of air to East Anstey ; hoping 
 to draw fresh life and vigour from those wild 
 moors he had known and loved so long. 
 
 But the change did him no good ; for on 
 the 4th of February he thus wrote : " I fear we 
 shall never meet again ; I don't gain strength 
 here, as I fancy I ought ; and, overwhelmed as 
 I am by letters, it is pain and grief to me to 
 write at all." 
 
 Then, on the 25th of March, having re- 
 turned to Black Torrington, he wrote his last 
 letter to the Author of this Memoir, " Ten 
 thousand thanks to you, my very dear old 
 friend, for your hearty invitation to the Circus ; 
 but if I were to set out to-morrow in my little 
 
396 MEMOIR OF 
 
 carriage, with George to drive, and Mary to 
 keep me in my place, I shouldn't get to Bath in 
 a fortnight, I am so very weak a little trip of 
 three miles to Buckland Filleigh House, and 
 back again, quite knocked me up." 
 
 Soon afterwards he went to Bude ; but, 
 writes Dr. Ash, " it did him more harm than 
 good, and I had to hasten his return home on 
 Saturday none too soon. He is weaker and 
 worse than I have ever seen him, but happily 
 is suffering no pain." 
 
 On the 24th of April the good doctor again 
 writes to say : " Mr. Russell is much the same 
 to-day. There is certainly no improvement in 
 his condition, nor can there be, for he takes in 
 literally nothing. He is, however, rather more 
 conscious, I think, and has fully appreciated the 
 kind message from the Prince received to- 
 day." 
 
 Night and day he was tenderly watched by 
 those around him, and all that human skill and 
 devotion could do was done by Dr. Ash. But 
 surely and rapidly the tide of life was now 
 ebbing ; the pulse fluttered, the keen eye be- 
 came clouded with a film, and gradually, peace- 
 fully, and without pain, the spirit of that once 
 
THE RE V. JOHN RUSSELL. 397 
 
 manly frame stole from its tenement, took wing, 
 " and returned unto God who gave it." 
 
 He died on the 28th of April, 1883, in his 
 88th year, and was buried at Swymbridge, 
 where at least a thousand people attended the 
 funeral. Royal and costly wreaths covered the 
 coffin ; but the most touching of all tributes were 
 those of the poor cottagers, who, weeping as 
 they went, brought their baskets and aprons 
 full of wild flowers, and literally showered them 
 into his grave. 
 
 " No further seek his merits to disclose, 
 
 Or draw his frailties from their dread abode 
 There they alike in trembling hope repose 
 The bosom of his Father and his God." 
 
 THE END. 
 
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 A REMAJRKABLB RUN WITH LORD GALW AY'S HOUNDS. 
 These hounds had one of the most remarkable runs yes- 
 terday within the memory of living sportsmen. Being 
 Christmas time the houses of the county gentry are full 
 of company, and a large field, including many strangers, 
 turned up at the meet, which was at Gringley-on-the- 
 Hill. With Viscount and Viscountess Galway, M. P., 
 from Serlby Hall, were her ladyship's sister and Mr 
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 and Mr W. Smith, Gringley ; Mr C. Wright, Auston ; ted on 
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 Bridgeman Simpson, Mr C." Marshall, and Mr A. White, (" for 
 Retford ; Mr G. Bingley, Mr and Mrs Otter, Eaton j 
 Hall; and many others. A first move was made JHAKK, 
 to Gringley Gorse, -where Morgan at once halloed a fox j 
 away, which did not stay to be found and a rare same ' 
 one he proved to be. With the large field streaming after 
 him he pointed for Walkerinerham, but after going over : w -,, 
 
 thrpp fipld* HP t.iirrwH f-n fho ri<*ht loowino. Poo- Tiw lT,'li ' VV ^ lln 
 
 s and 
 
 three fields he turned to the right leaving Pear Tree Hill 
 just on the left, and over the Gainsborough Road, skirting 
 Clayworth Wood, and nearly up to Wheatiey Grange. 
 The pace and the heavy country had already besrun to tell 
 upon some of the field," when he turned to the left and 
 irsuers on to. Bole Fields and over the Gains- 
 borough Road to theTlflPof Wheatiey village, and away at 
 a good hunting pace over West Burton Farm to Sturton- 
 en-le-3teeple, turning to the left and over the Manchester, 
 A New EC Sheffield, and Lincolnshire Railway to the village, which 
 Fifty Illust he threaded, and away on the west side nearly to North 
 especially : Leverton ; but here he turned over the Leverton Road and 
 cloth, 6s. pn to Fenton Bank, straight away to the eorse, through 
 it, and on to Littleborousrh, threading the small osier 
 bed, and running parallel with the Trent up to 
 Cottam Osiers, down to the railway bridge over 
 the Trent at Torksey, and away still at a 
 racing pace to the earths at Rampton, which he 
 found stopped against him, and rattled on with- 
 out angering to Fleet Plantation, and skirting it away to 
 Colonel Eyre's osiers on the Trent Bank, but turned short 
 to the left, went back with those of the numerous field 
 who had managed to survive by Torksey Bridge, re- 
 crossing the railway, and runniner nearly the same line 
 
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 by CRUIK 
 
 By the F 
 Legends. ' 
 volume, c 
 
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 back to Littleborough, the houndsliterally racing with their 
 tox. a hundred yards in front up to Fenton Gorse, and 
 nearly up to Sturton, where he. turned sharp round into 
 Fenton Bank, and here they ran up to him, but he still 
 tried hard to beat them, and the brook gave him a short 
 reispite. But they were not to be denied, and pulled him 
 down in Mr Cobb's garden, after a grand hunting run of 
 2 hours and 25 minutes, which will not be forgotten by 
 those who were up at the finish. 
 
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