Well, then, if it was almost like a habit in some districts, where foxes were systematically kept down, for a past generation to save the day’s sport by resorting to a bagman, the reader must not be shocked if I confess to being a living witness to what in charity we may ascribe to an hereditary tendency. After all, there was more excuse for them than for some noblemen. They at least dug out the wild fox from the sea-cliffs, while the fashionable game-preserver, or the titled vulpicide, purchased his fox in Leadenhall. I have just turned up an old ballad which I have never seen in print, and as it touches on the subject, I may as well give it a place here, premising, however, that I cannot but think it is libellous, looking to the way in which subsequent bearers of the title of Lonsdale have associated themselves with the best interests of real sport. LORD LONSDALE’S HOUNDS: 1849-1850. It was an Earl of ancient name Who hunted the fox, but preferred him tame, Though his sire had been a hunter free, As bold as e’er rode o’er a grass countree. The sire would mount his high-bred horse, And view the wild fox from the hillside gorse; The son goes down by a second-class train, Worries a bagman, and home again. ’Tis half-past twelve by the railway clocks, And the Earl has called for his horse and his fox; And behind the Earl there rides the Earl’s groom, And then comes a man with a long birch broom, Clad in the Earl’s discarded breeches, Who will tickle the fox when he comes to the ditches. The Earl’s admirers are ranged in Brown’s yard, They all wear top-boots and intend to ride hard; Whether “wily fox” or timid hare Be the game to-day, none of them care. Well was it the Earl had called for his fox, And brought it from Tring in a little deal box, For three hours and more they drew for a hare, But drew in vain! All was blank despair. Then said the Earl to the elder Brown, “Open your box and turn him down.” So they turned him down in Aylesbury vale, In front of a fence called a post and a rail, To suit the views of a certain gent, Who rather liked “Rails,”[3] and thought he went. Over the rails the first to fly Was the gent of course, but the fox was shy, And would have declined, but the Earl and his groom, The huntsman and whip, and his man with the broom, Two boys in a cart, and the Browns, Sam and John, Wouldn’t hear of his shirking, and drove him along. A pleasant line the captive took, Wouldn’t have doubles, avoided the brook; As you may imagine, he ran by rule, Only taking the leaps he had learned at school.