Tom was a small eight or nine stone man, with roundish face, marked with small pox, and a pair of eyes that twinkled with good humour. He possessed great strength as well as courage and resolution, and displayed an equanimity of temper which made him many friends. The huntsman was John Sewell, and under him he performed his duties in a way so satisfactory to his master and all who hunted with him, as to be deemed the best whipper-in in England. None, it was said, could bring up the tail end of a pack, or sustain the burst of a long chase, and be in at the death with every hound well up, like Tom. His plan was to allow his hounds their own cast without lifting, unless they showed wildness; and if young hounds dwelt on a stale drag behind the pack he whipped them on to those on the right line. He never aspired to be more than “a serving-man;” he wished, however, to be considered “a good whipper-in,” and his fame as such spread through the country. There was not a spark of envy in his composition, and he was one of the happiest fellows in the universe. The lessons he seemed to have learnt, and which appeared to have sunk deepest into his unsophisticated nature, were those of being honest and of ordering himself “lowly and reverently towards his betters,” for whom he had a reverence which grew profound if they happened to have added to their qualifications of being good sportsmen that of being “_Parliament_ men.” Tom’s voice was something extraordinary, and on one occasion when he had fallen into an old pit shaft, which had given way on the sides, and could not get out, it saved him. His halloo to the dogs brought him assistance, and he was extricated. It was capable of wonderful modulations, and to hear him rehearse the sports of the day in the big roomy servants’ kitchen at the Hall, and give his tally-ho, or who-who-hoop, was considered a treat. On one occasion, when Tom was in better trim than usual, the old housekeeper is said to have remarked, “La! Tom, you have given the who-who-hoop, as you call it, so very loud and strong to-day that you have set the cups and saucers a dancing;” to which a gentleman, who had purposely placed himself within hearing, replied, “I am not at all surprised—his voice is music itself. I am astonished and delighted, and hardly know how to praise it enough. I never heard anything so attractive and inspiring before in the whole course of my life; its tones are as fine and mellow as a French horn.”