Hunting ReminiscencesPease, Alfred E. (Alfred Edward), Sir
General
Hunting Reminiscences
Pease, Alfred E. (Alfred Edward), Sir
Hunting
My brother (Mr. J. A. Pease, now M.P.), and Capt. B. H. Philips
(of the 23rd R. W. F.), with myself, together occupied a house in
Trinity Street. Some days we used to sally out together to inspect
the Fitzwilliam, at Gidding Windmill, or some other favourite spot,
and take the Drag three afternoons a week to fill up the time between
hunting days.
Of all animals under the sun an undergraduate’s horse is the most
wonderful. I have known Philips ride with the Drag on Friday, hunt with
the Fitzwilliam on Saturday, again on Monday, and go to the Pytchley
(Woodland) on Tuesday, Lucifer (appropriate name) his mount each day,
but truth compels me to add, not for another three weeks afterwards.
The days with the Fitzwilliam were often very hard days for horses.
It meant leaving before seven in the morning, boxing to Huntingdon,
and after a good breakfast at the “George,” hacking any distance from
six to twelve miles to cover--and the same way home again. One such
day is fixed in my mind, for it was the one on which I first donned a
pink coat, and I have found the following account in a letter I wrote:
“Yesterday nine of us went by the 7.0 train to Huntingdon, where we
had breakfast. We then hacked on eleven miles to the meet. We had
a wonderful fast hunting-run, hounds going all the time, from five
minutes to one till ten minutes past three. Bertie Philips’ and Devas’
(Mr. E. Devas) horses were ridden to a standstill half an hour before
we finished, and all our horses were pretty well cooked. We had then
thirteen miles to Huntingdon on “done” horses. Philips dragged his
about four miles to a village, then put up. We struggled on to the
next, sat in the inn an hour, and started again, eventually reaching
Huntingdon, where we left the horses and caught a train to Cambridge.
The country was very deep, and it was a tremendous run.”
Among the men whose names I remember, who distinguished themselves
with the Drag in my time were the following:--Mr. Hoole (killed whilst
riding for the ’Varsity Whip, at St. Ives, 1876); Mr. Herbert Magniac
(master of the Drag, 1877-78); Earl of Yarborough, Lord Binning, Sir
John Willoughby, Sir H. Meux, Hon. A. G. Lawley, Hon. A. Lawley, Hon.
R. White, Hons. R. and H. Fitzwilliam, Messrs. J. M. Paulton, J.
A. Pease, Graham, Barnard, P. Aylmer, E. Aylmer, H. Russell, F. R.
Meuricoffre, B. H. Philips, H. C. Bentley, W. C. Ellis, R. L. Pike,
C. Antrobus, C. A. Fellowes, and E. Devas. There are, doubtless, many
other names which should occur to me.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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