Very romantic tales are told of long runs by a superannuated servant of the Foresters, old Simkiss, who had them from his father; but we forbear troubling the reader with more than an outline of one of these, that of Old Tinker. Old Tinker was the name of a fox, with more than the usual cunning of his species, that had often proved more than a match for the hounds; and one morning the Squire, having made up his mind for a run, repaired to Tickwood, where this fox was put up. On hearing the dogs in full cry the Squire vowed he would “Follow the devil this time to hell’s doors but he would catch him.” Reynard, it appears, went off in the direction of the Clee Hills; but took a turn, and made for Thatcher’s Coppice; from there to the Titterstone Hill, and then back to Tickwood, where the hounds again ousted him, and over the same ground again. On arriving at the Brown Clee Hills the huntsman’s horse was so blown that he took Moody’s, sending Tom with his own to the nearest inn to get spiced ale and a feed. By this time the fox was on his way back, and the horse on which Tom was seated no sooner heard the horn sounding than he dashed away and joined in the chase. Ten couples of fresh hounds were now set loose at the kennels in Willey Hollow, and these again turned the fox in the direction of Aldenham, but all besides Moody were now far behind, and his horse fell dead beneath him. The dogs, too, had had enough; they refused to go further, and Old Tinker once more beat his pursuers, but only to die in a drain on the Aldenham estate, where he was found a week afterwards. “A braver choice of dauntless spirits never Dash’d after hound,” it is said, and to commemorate one of the good things of this kind, a long home-spun ditty was wont to be sung in public-houses by tenants on the estate, the first few lines of which were as follows:— “Salopians every one, Of high and low degree, Who take delight in fox-hunting, Come listen unto me. “A story true I’ll tell to you Concerning of a fox, How they hunted him on Tickwood side O’er Benthall Edge and rocks. “Says Reynard, ‘I’ll take you o’er to Willey Park Above there, for when we fairly get aground I value neither huntsmen all Nor Squire Forester’s best hound. “‘I know your dogs are stout and good, That they’ll run me like the wind! But I’ll tread lightly on the land, And leave no scent behind.’” Other verses describe the hunt, and Reynard, on being run to earth, asking for quarter on condition that “He will both promise and fulfil, Neither ducks nor geese to kill, Nor lambs upon the hill;”